Book contents
- From Crust to Core
- From Crust to Core
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Foreword
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1 Why Carbon in Earth Matters
- 2 The Origin of Deep Carbon in Deep Space
- 3 Deliveries of Cosmic Carbon Continue
- 4 On the Nature of Earth’s Interior
- 5 Earth’s Physical Interior Revealed
- 6 Thousands, Millions or Billions
- 7 Physics and Chemistry of Deep Earth
- 8 Confronting the Continental Drift Conundrum
- 9 The Mid-Atlantic Ridge and Rift Valley
- 10 Earth’s Deep Dynamics Discovered
- 11 Reversals of Fortune
- 12 Deep Carbon
- 13 Carbon-Bearing Phases in the Mantle
- 14 Diamond in the Mantle
- 15 Deep Life
- Glossary
- Biographical Notes
- Index
- References
7 - Physics and Chemistry of Deep Earth
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 December 2020
Book contents
- From Crust to Core
- From Crust to Core
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Foreword
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1 Why Carbon in Earth Matters
- 2 The Origin of Deep Carbon in Deep Space
- 3 Deliveries of Cosmic Carbon Continue
- 4 On the Nature of Earth’s Interior
- 5 Earth’s Physical Interior Revealed
- 6 Thousands, Millions or Billions
- 7 Physics and Chemistry of Deep Earth
- 8 Confronting the Continental Drift Conundrum
- 9 The Mid-Atlantic Ridge and Rift Valley
- 10 Earth’s Deep Dynamics Discovered
- 11 Reversals of Fortune
- 12 Deep Carbon
- 13 Carbon-Bearing Phases in the Mantle
- 14 Diamond in the Mantle
- 15 Deep Life
- Glossary
- Biographical Notes
- Index
- References
Summary
The currently accepted age of Earth is 4.55 billion years, a figure that has not changed significantly for 70 years. From the 1850s to the 1950s, the question of the age of Earth advanced from simply being an airy speculation driven by those geologists willing to allow an indefinitely large amount of past time and those biologists who favored evolution. Unexpected discoveries in physics and chemistry transformed Earth history from intelligent guesswork to a precision science defined by physical laws. This chapter summarizes a century-long pathway of discoveries in physics that would dramatically improve our understanding of the age and properties of the deep Earth, and in particular the deep secrets hidden locked in the carbon atoms in the interior of Earth.
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- Chapter
- Information
- From Crust to CoreA Chronicle of Deep Carbon Science, pp. 119 - 146Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2020
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