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Hissyspit

(45,788 posts)
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 08:24 AM Jun 2014

Earth May Have Underground 'Ocean' Three Times That on Surface

Last edited Fri Jun 13, 2014, 09:52 AM - Edit history (1)

Source: The Guardian

Earth may have underground 'ocean' three times that on surface

Scientists say rock layer hundreds of miles down holds vast amount of water, opening up new theories on how planet formed


Melissa Davey
Thursday 12 June 2014 23.53 EDT

After decades of searching scientists have discovered that a vast reservoir of water, enough to fill the Earth’s oceans three times over, may be trapped hundreds of miles beneath the surface, potentially transforming our understanding of how the planet was formed.

The water is locked up in a mineral called ringwoodite about 660km (400 miles) beneath the crust of the Earth, researchers say. Geophysicist Steve Jacobsen from Northwestern University in the US co-authored the study published in the journal Science and said the discovery suggested Earth’s water may have come from within, driven to the surface by geological activity, rather than being deposited by icy comets hitting the forming planet as held by the prevailing theories.

“Geological processes on the Earth’s surface, such as earthquakes or erupting volcanoes, are an expression of what is going on inside the Earth, out of our sight,” Jacobsen said.

“I think we are finally seeing evidence for a whole-Earth water cycle, which may help explain the vast amount of liquid water on the surface of our habitable planet. Scientists have been looking for this missing deep water for decades.”

Jacobsen and his colleagues are the first to provide direct evidence that there may be water in an area of the Earth’s mantle known as the transition zone. They based their findings on a study of a vast underground region extending across most of the interior of the US.

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/jun/13/earth-may-have-underground-ocean-three-times-that-on-surface

53 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
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Earth May Have Underground 'Ocean' Three Times That on Surface (Original Post) Hissyspit Jun 2014 OP
ohhh good! heaven05 Jun 2014 #1
Well, yes and no. Erich Bloodaxe BSN Jun 2014 #3
geez! heaven05 Jun 2014 #22
Thank-you!! SkyDaddy7 Jun 2014 #33
Minerals are only 'stable' within specific Erich Bloodaxe BSN Jun 2014 #35
(btw, 'a ton of pressure' Erich Bloodaxe BSN Jun 2014 #36
Thank you for the explanation enlightenment Jun 2014 #38
Well, Erich Bloodaxe BSN Jun 2014 #39
Truth be told? enlightenment Jun 2014 #43
Thanks again...If SkyDaddy7 Jun 2014 #42
That was my thought - how deep do we drill for oil already? I also thought of the hot springs in jwirr Jun 2014 #23
I forsee many Hollow Earth/Atlantis mashup articles coming from this Bosonic Jun 2014 #2
Not theories, hypothesis Android3.14 Jun 2014 #4
There is hard evidence, though, for this idea: Maedhros Jun 2014 #40
maybe part of it is like journey to the center of the earth tomm2thumbs Jun 2014 #5
Jules Verne had an amazing imagination. BootinUp Jun 2014 #6
I can imagine people of his day flocking to get his books and being blown away by it all tomm2thumbs Jun 2014 #7
This is exactly what I was thing of to MFM008 Jun 2014 #53
Drill, baby, drill! randome Jun 2014 #8
Well, there goes the dreams of those who believe they can control the water market. Baitball Blogger Jun 2014 #9
Silly libtards... HuskyOffset Jun 2014 #10
Drowning satan! LisaLynne Jun 2014 #15
Funny how that omnipotent deity Arugula Latte Jun 2014 #50
Uh Oh. This will send the fundy Noah's flood folks into a tizzy. "Fountains of the deep" baby! yellowcanine Jun 2014 #11
Maybe we can send them all fundies underground to look for these fountains davidpdx Jun 2014 #16
One does have to cross the River Styx to get to Hades.... yellowcanine Jun 2014 #18
and Kirk Cameron shall lead them Arugula Latte Jun 2014 #51
Damn, you beat me to it packman Jun 2014 #19
Windows? griloco Jun 2014 #20
Very interesting......... Swede Atlanta Jun 2014 #12
Actually there is a reference in the Bible....... yellowcanine Jun 2014 #14
Interesting, there's a book based on this theory phantom power Jun 2014 #13
Baxter's work is amazing NickB79 Jun 2014 #45
Ya...more to pollute! SoapBox Jun 2014 #17
New theories - cool. toby jo Jun 2014 #21
Fiction HelenWheels Jun 2014 #24
I bet the Water will be Hot. PeoViejo Jun 2014 #25
before you get your hopes up, folks.... paleotn Jun 2014 #26
Just reading most of the comments in this thread Erich Bloodaxe BSN Jun 2014 #32
You just need to BELIEVE, Erich! Believe in Pellucidar! randome Jun 2014 #34
Heh. Erich Bloodaxe BSN Jun 2014 #37
Minerals behave very strangely at 2-4 GPa pressures. Maedhros Jun 2014 #41
Interesting that we explore & seemingly "know" more about space than our own planet. (nt) Inkfreak Jun 2014 #27
It's a whole lot easier to look at or travel to space FiveGoodMen Jun 2014 #29
This message was self-deleted by its author Inkfreak Jun 2014 #28
Love this. So much more compelling... JackRiddler Jun 2014 #30
Surf's up! ...er, down. tofuandbeer Jun 2014 #31
It certainly is defacto7 Jun 2014 #44
Our planet formed in the habitable zone of our star. roamer65 Jun 2014 #46
Nice. PFunk Jun 2014 #47
Fascinating. KnR to read later Hekate Jun 2014 #48
See? Genesis was right! Raphael Campos Jun 2014 #49
when the sun was shining, yes and the stars were bright all through the night MisterP Jun 2014 #52

Erich Bloodaxe BSN

(14,733 posts)
3. Well, yes and no.
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 08:55 AM
Jun 2014

It's not really water til it gets up here. Ringwoodite, the mineral mentioned, can include hydroxide (OH) ions, and is stable at high pressures found deep in the crust. So there aren't actually 'oceans' down there, just lots of bound up oxygen and hydrogen. It's oceans 'worth' of hydrogen and oxygen down there, not actual H2O. So no lost Atlantis either

SkyDaddy7

(6,045 posts)
33. Thank-you!!
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 01:35 PM
Jun 2014

For the explanation...Still trying to understand why they say "water" because even before you mentioned there were no "oceans" I knew that but I don't understand why researchers are calling this "missing water" when it is simply Oxygen & Hydrogen but that is not water. If this Ringwoodite, the mineral mentioned just a sign that water once existed or would there be water if the mineral was to be brought to the surface somehow?

Forgive my ignorance...Thanks.

Erich Bloodaxe BSN

(14,733 posts)
35. Minerals are only 'stable' within specific
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 01:58 PM
Jun 2014

pressure and temperature regimes. If I take a chunk of carbon, stable here at 1 atmosphere of pressure and room temperature, and put it under a ton of pressure and heat, I can change its structure to turn it into diamond. And this can happen quickly. Going in the other direction, from high to low pressures, that diamond will only degrade very slowly. If I put it in a mix with several other minerals and do the same thing, they'll shuffle themselves around to try and find the arrangement in which they're most stable, and swap out elements to form new minerals. In the crust, that means you wind up with a lot of olivine and spinel like minerals.

Bring them up to the surface, and they'll start interacting with various liquids and gases and be weathered - sometimes into new minerals, although in many cases simply mechanically changed, not chemically, into smaller pieces. Sandstone is mainly just a bunch of compacted smaller pieces of quartz. But throw iron up onto the surface, and it will oxidize over time.

I'm not familiar with ringwoodite structure specifically, but how easily you could break free that hydroxide depends upon how it's attached to the rest of the structure. (And now you've got me wondering if my 20 or so year old 'encyclopedia of mineralogy' even has ringwoodite listed in it...) At any rate, it's certainly possible that the water currently on the surface of the earth actually came from ringwoodite forced up to the surface via tectonic and volcanic processes, and all of those hydroxides chemically shifting at low temps and pressures into water. (the bonds in water are fairly weak - that's why you can do experiments in grade school where you use electricity to break water apart into oxygen and hydrogen.) If so, that puts forward a very intriguing view of the evolution of the planetary surface.

Erich Bloodaxe BSN

(14,733 posts)
39. Well,
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 03:06 PM
Jun 2014

I haven't actually done anything geology-related since the end of the last millennium, so I hope I didn't mangle my attempt to present a simplified version of things too badly

I finished up the degree, then instantly moved into another field...

enlightenment

(8,830 posts)
43. Truth be told?
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 03:44 PM
Jun 2014

I'm an historian (so really, I wouldn't know if you mangled it). It sounded clear enough to me that I could make a passable attempt at explaining it to someone else, which is my criteria for a useful simplified explanation!

SkyDaddy7

(6,045 posts)
42. Thanks again...If
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 03:22 PM
Jun 2014

You happen to be a Father then Happy Father's Day...If not, have good weekend!! And thanks again I really find that stuff fascinating...I don't fully understand all of it but I know enough for it to be interesting!

jwirr

(39,215 posts)
23. That was my thought - how deep do we drill for oil already? I also thought of the hot springs in
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 11:04 AM
Jun 2014

various areas. And Old Faithful. Connected - who knows.

 

Android3.14

(5,402 posts)
4. Not theories, hypothesis
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 09:00 AM
Jun 2014

The research did not find water. In the lede of the article, note the word "may". We don't have any holes that reach 400 miles. What he has is a hypothesis and a piece of corroborating evidence based on seismometer data and lab experiments using rock under high pressure.

This has a long way to go before it reaches anything like a scientific theory.

 

Maedhros

(10,007 posts)
40. There is hard evidence, though, for this idea:
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 03:13 PM
Jun 2014
http://www.livescience.com/44057-diamond-inclusions-mantle-water-earth.html

A battered diamond that survived a trip from "hell" confirms a long-held theory: Earth's mantle holds an ocean's worth of water.

"It's actually the confirmation that there is a very, very large amount of water that's trapped in a really distinct layer in the deep Earth," said Graham Pearson, lead study author and a geochemist at the University of Alberta in Canada. The findings were published today (March 12) in the journal Nature.

The worthless-looking diamond encloses a tiny piece of an olivine mineral called ringwoodite, and it's the first time the mineral has been found on Earth's surface in anything other than meteorites or laboratories. Ringwoodite only forms under extreme pressure, such as the crushing load about 320 miles (515 kilometers) deep in the mantle.


Exciting stuff - I studied in the U of A lab from 1991 - 1995.

tomm2thumbs

(13,297 posts)
7. I can imagine people of his day flocking to get his books and being blown away by it all
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 09:18 AM
Jun 2014

Yup, you are right and it holds up today

MFM008

(19,763 posts)
53. This is exactly what I was thing of to
Sun Jun 15, 2014, 05:28 PM
Jun 2014

The Sagnussum ocean from one of my favorite movies as a kid.

 

randome

(34,845 posts)
8. Drill, baby, drill!
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 09:22 AM
Jun 2014

[hr][font color="blue"][center]Stop looking for heroes. BE one.[/center][/font][hr]

HuskyOffset

(882 posts)
10. Silly libtards...
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 09:48 AM
Jun 2014

...and your "science". It's obviously the water from the Great Flood. God's just storing it down there in case He needs it for something, like cooling the earth down from global warming, which doesn't exist. Or drowning Satan, who is very real. Read the Bible.














*This post is sarcasm.

yellowcanine

(35,690 posts)
11. Uh Oh. This will send the fundy Noah's flood folks into a tizzy. "Fountains of the deep" baby!
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 09:49 AM
Jun 2014

That's what I'm talkin' about! TIME!

Genesis 7:11
11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.

davidpdx

(22,000 posts)
16. Maybe we can send them all fundies underground to look for these fountains
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 10:09 AM
Jun 2014

They can go there on their way to hell.

yellowcanine

(35,690 posts)
18. One does have to cross the River Styx to get to Hades....
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 10:24 AM
Jun 2014

Maybe if one goes up the River Styx you get to the fountains?
But of course one has to be dead to get on the river at all I believe.

 

packman

(16,296 posts)
19. Damn, you beat me to it
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 10:41 AM
Jun 2014

Those Bronze Age guys sitting in caves writting that shit knew, just knew I tell you, about all the fountains of the great deep.

 

Swede Atlanta

(3,596 posts)
12. Very interesting.........
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 09:51 AM
Jun 2014

Republicans will deny it to be true because the Bible doesn't say anything about a hidden buried ocean in Genesis.

yellowcanine

(35,690 posts)
14. Actually there is a reference in the Bible.......
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 10:02 AM
Jun 2014

Genesis 7:11
11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.

Fundies will seize on this, count on it.

HelenWheels

(2,284 posts)
24. Fiction
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 11:07 AM
Jun 2014

I'm reading a fiction book about this. The scientists get trapped by the underground ocean that has a man eating monster in it.

 

PeoViejo

(2,178 posts)
25. I bet the Water will be Hot.
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 11:18 AM
Jun 2014

..more like high-pressure Steam. Water of Hydration can be easily driven off by heat. All that needs to be done is lower the pressure being applied to the mineral holding it.

paleotn

(17,759 posts)
26. before you get your hopes up, folks....
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 11:31 AM
Jun 2014

....that there's some great, hidden ocean down there, ringwoodite does not hold liquid water within its structure, but hydroxide ions. Shave off one of the H atoms in normal H2O and you have hydroxide, HO. If it picks up a H+ cation, than bingo, H2O.

This is interesting though. Some of the relatively recent findings, blurring of the lines between comets and asteroids (most may be a combination of both) suggests that water was present throughout the formation of Earth, thus beginning a more geologically based water cycle we're just beginning to understand.

Erich Bloodaxe BSN

(14,733 posts)
32. Just reading most of the comments in this thread
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 01:16 PM
Jun 2014

it's a great example of how journalism misunderstands science and transmits it in a mangled form that misleads the public as to what the original science is actually saying. They keep saying 'water' and 'ocean', and the casual reader instantly goes to thinking they're saying underground rivers and giant, water-filled caverns.

 

randome

(34,845 posts)
34. You just need to BELIEVE, Erich! Believe in Pellucidar!
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 01:45 PM
Jun 2014

[hr][font color="blue"][center]The truth doesn’t always set you free.
Sometimes it builds a bigger cage around the one you’re already in.
[/center][/font][hr]

 

Maedhros

(10,007 posts)
41. Minerals behave very strangely at 2-4 GPa pressures.
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 03:19 PM
Jun 2014

The water is literally dissolved in the mantle minerals, which is a hard concept to envision - we usually think of solids being dissolved in water, not the other way around.

Response to Hissyspit (Original post)

 

JackRiddler

(24,979 posts)
30. Love this. So much more compelling...
Fri Jun 13, 2014, 12:50 PM
Jun 2014

Than the comet theory. Though I always have a preference for phenomena that arise from endogenous processes rather than non-sequitur exogenous disruptive events. (That's why it took me a long time to allow that the asteroid got the dinosaurs, rather than their own success in over-exploiting their own habitat. The latter being a kind of anthropomorphic tale, I know.)

roamer65

(36,738 posts)
46. Our planet formed in the habitable zone of our star.
Sat Jun 14, 2014, 09:45 AM
Jun 2014

Water can exist in its three forms within that zone...solid, liquid and gaseous within that zone. I never really believed comet impacts could have created our oceans.

Not surprised on hearing this story and it really makes sense.

Gives us hope that there are other planets out there like ours.

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