Scientists have discovered an unprecedented structure inside the Earth – the Enseñame de Ciencia

Since the beginning of human history on Earth, he has tried to investigate how the place we live in was formed, just as various theories have been put forward about the origin of life and the formation of the planet itself.

Having this information has allowed scientists to gain a better understanding of natural events that can endanger people’s lives, such as earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

Until now, it is believed that there is a chain of layers that make up the planet, interact with each other and are responsible for all physical phenomena on the planet, as well as many biological interactions.

Within the layers that make up our planet, its center was thought to consist of a liquid ball of iron called the core.

However, a new study suggests that an iron ball with a radius of about 650 kilometers lies within the Earth’s inner core, according to the research. published From the journal Nature.

These findings can help improve understanding of planet formation and evolution, as well as various phenomena.

In the past 20 years, the hypothesis of a smaller core has been the subject of debate among the scientific community, but this new research provides strong evidence, thanks to the technique based on measuring the echoes of the seismic waves generated. as a result of earthquakes around the world.

“This study uses the growing global network of seismographs to produce global stacks of some individually significant seismic events,” according to study authors Thanh Son Pham and Hvuje Teklasik of the Australian National University.

The research shows that the researchers were able to amplify the signal of various related seismic phenomena, breaking a record: for the first time the echo (the sound phenomenon caused by reflection, which consists of a slight constancy of sound once the original source stops emitting it) has been identified for the first time: treble, quaternary, and pentameral seismic, Which in turn allowed for a more detailed survey of the inner core.

“To our knowledge, resonances of more than two steps have not yet been described in the seismology-related literature,” explain the study authors.

According to the results obtained from this investigation, the behavior of the “new core” when faced with the propagation of seismic waves is slightly different from what happens in what is known as the inner core of the Earth.

What does the new core look like at the center of the Earth?

The researchers describe this newly discovered layer in the Earth’s interior as a “solid central sphere”, which has a slightly different structure than was thought to be the center of the planet, however, they comment that more research is needed.

“We hope the findings will inspire further scrutiny of existing seismic records to uncover hidden signals that are shedding light on Earth’s interior,” comment the authors.

For more information, see: nature.