A diamond from the depths of the earth with impulsed
Diamonds formed on the Earth’s lower cloak contain fragments of minerals that are helping scientists to understand the inner functioning of our planet.
In diamonds, even impurities have value – This is what, the researcher of the American Museum of Natural History, in New York, Nester Korolev.
These impurities have an invaluable value due to the information they contain on the ongoing geological processes in the depths of the earth. Moreover, some of them do not even look like Nothing that has been found before.
“In these impurities, I hope we will discover a novo mineral“Korolev said, showing the diamond.
This particular diamond was formed about 600 kilometers below the surface, near the border between the upper cloak and the lower cloak. This makes it one of the deeper formation objects that returned to the surface of the planet and the hands of the geologists.
This diamond was unearthed from a mine in Brazil. It is known that it was formed in the lower cloak because it contains inclusions of a silicate perovskite mineral called davematewhich only occurs to these depths.
The mysterious mineral hidden in it can reveal more about the conditions in the depths of the soil. To find out, the geologists have sent a fragment of the little diamond to France, where it is being bombarded with powerful x -rays of syrotron to Determine the precise crystal structure of the mysterious mineral.
The results are not yet known, but it would not be the first new mineral to be discovered on a diamond.
When the answer arrives, researchers can discover, for example, the amount of water that these ocean crust plates carry to the lower cloak. But This depends on the exact crystal structure of the new minerals formed when the oceanic crust reaches the transition zone between the upper and lower cloak and is transformed by pressure and heat.
Hunting for unknown minerals
Korolev and his museum colleagues are using these rare diamonds to Study directly the material that constitutes the interior of the earth – An underground kingdom about which we still know surprisingly little.
As already mentioned, the work may reveal new important information, such as the amount of water that is transported to the lower cloak when the Earth’s rock crust plates are dragged into the planet in the subduction zones. In addition, we can also know how, or if this deep water influences the behavior of the tectonic plates of the earth.
As New Scientist writes, we can also create images from the interior of the Earth by studying the behavior of the seismic waves that cross the planet, while the high pressure experiences in the laboratory and computer models can simulate underground conditions.
Os Diamonds are the great ally of these investigationsbecause they are strong enough to maintain their crystal structure – as well as the structure of the minerals arrested inside – Through the extreme changes of pressure and temperature that occur in the course of the deeper regions to the surface.
“The exact way these deep diamonds make these trips remains enigmatic,” he reflects Kate Kiseevapetrologist at the Korolev Museum and Counselor.
Kiseeva is a fan of the theory that says diamonds are transported up with convection material on the lower cloak, taking hundreds of millions of years to reach the rock roots of the continents. From there, they can be designed to the surface through deeply rooted kimberlito volcanoes.
An alternative theory is that diamonds are transported to the base of kimberlites in hot and floating rock columns, known as cloak feathers.
