A team of scientists put forward a groundbreaking theory that could potentially unravel two cosmic mysteries. One pertains to a celestial body orbiting Earth daily, while the other involves a hidden enigma within our planet.
The first puzzle revolves around the moon’s formation, and the prevailing theory suggests it resulted from a colossal collision between Earth and a forming planet some 4.5 billion years ago.
This cosmic impact with Theia, a Mars-sized ancient planet, ejected enough material into space to coalesce and form the moon. The intriguing aspect of the study suggests that traces of Theia might not be in the Earth’s atmosphere but concealed beneath its surface.
Buried deep, 2900 kilometers below the Earth’s surface, two substantial “points” have captured scientists’ attention since their discovery through seismic waves in the 1980s. These masses, akin to the size of continents, reside in the Earth’s mantle—the layer separating the core from the crust—beneath Africa and the Pacific Ocean.
These masses, hotter and denser than their surroundings, are theorized to be the “buried remnants” of Theia that penetrated the Earth during the colossal collision, as indicated by computer simulations.
Chen Yuan, a researcher at the California Institute of Technology (CalTech) and the lead author of the study, described the collision as the “most violent event Earth has experienced,” expressing surprise at the absence of any visible trace. His intriguing answer to the collision’s location: “beneath the Earth.”
The interdisciplinary research brought together experts in space and geology.
Theia’s collision during Earth’s formation occurred at a speed exceeding 36,000 kilometers per hour, causing a fragment to delve “deep into the Earth’s lower mantle.”
The fused rock pieces, with dimensions ranging from tens of kilometers, solidified and descended to the Earth’s mantle and core boundaries, aided by a higher concentration of iron oxide than in the Earth’s surroundings, making them heavier.
These rock accumulations formed two distinct masses, each surpassing the moon in size, according to Yuan. However, he emphasizes that these conclusions stem from incomplete models and simulation processes.
Christian Schroeder, an Earth sciences and planetary exploration expert at the University of Stirling in Scotland, asserted that Yuan’s theory “aligns with many indicators” and deems the findings “an important result.”
While these results may not conclusively answer the moon’s origin, they offer a “reliable explanation for the strange occurrences observed at the boundaries between the Earth’s mantle and its core,” according to Schroeder. As for Theia’s remnants, they may be “responsible for important processes ongoing on Earth,” he added.
These two masses are known to carry columns from the mantle and melted materials to the Earth’s crust, phenomena intricately tied to volcanic eruptions and the evolution of continents. Yuan posits that Theia’s impact “played a role in the Earth’s development over 4.5 billion years,” rendering it “unique and different from other rocky planets.”
Leave a Reply