Raining Diamonds Across the Universe

Uranus and Neptune, ice giants where scientists believe diamond rain falls below the surface.

It could be raining diamonds on planets throughout the universe, scientists suggested Friday, after using common plastic to recreate the strange precipitation believed to form deep inside Uranus and Neptune.

Scientists had previously theorized that extremely high pressure and temperatures turn hydrogen and carbon into solid diamonds thousands of kilometers below the surface of the ice giants.

Now new research, published in Science Advances, inserted oxygen into the mix, finding that "diamond rain" could be more common than thought.

Ice giants like Neptune and Uranus are thought to be the most common form of planet outside our Solar System, which means diamond rain could be occurring across the universe.

Dominik Kraus, a physicist at Germany's HZDR research lab and one of the study's authors, said that diamond precipitation was quite different to rain on Earth.

Under the surface of the planets is believed to be a "hot, dense liquid", where the diamonds form and slowly sink down to the rocky, potentially Earth-size cores more than 10,000 kilometers (6,200 miles) below, he said.

There fallen diamonds could form vast layers that span "hundreds of kilometers or even more", Kraus told AFP.

While these diamonds might not be shiny and cut like a "a nice gem on a ring", he said they were formed via similar forces as on Earth.

Aiming to replicate the process, the research team found the necessary mix of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen in a readily available source—PET plastic, which is used for everyday food packaging and bottles.

Kraus said that while the researchers used very clean PET plastic, "in principle the experiment should work with Coca-Cola bottles".  READ MORE...

Earth's Inner Core Oscillates

Scientists identify a six-year cycle of super- and sub-rotation that affected the length of a day based on their analysis of seismic data.

Earth’s structure is divided into layers, with the inner core at the center followed by the outer core, lower mantle, upper mantle, crust, and atmosphere. The inner core is the hottest part of the planet at about 10,000 °F (5400 °C), which is similar to the temperature of the surface of the sun!

Believed to consist mostly of an iron-nickel alloy, the inner core is mainly a solid ball with a radius of about 760 miles (1,220 km). It rotates slightly faster than the planet as a whole, which is called super-rotation.

University of Southern California (USC) scientists have found evidence that the Earth’s inner core oscillates, contradicting previously accepted models that suggested it consistently rotates at a faster rate than the planet’s surface.

Their study, published today (June 10, 2022) in the journal Science Advances, shows that the inner core changed direction in the six-year period from 1969-74, according to the analysis of seismic data. The scientists say their model of inner core movement also explains the variation in the length of a day, which has been shown to oscillate persistently for the past several decades.  READ MORE...