A Quadrillion Tons Of Diamonds May Lie In Earth
The intense heat and pressure at the Earth's core, deep beneath the surface, is enough to make diamonds out of carbon, scientists say.
Researchers from Arizona State University's School of Earth and Space Exploration investigated the conditions at the boundary between the Earth's metal core and the magma in the mantle, and according to their paper published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, have found that the carbon in the core's liquid iron metal alloy can form diamonds.
"The stable form of carbon at the pressure-temperature conditions of the Earth's core-mantle boundary is diamond," Dan Shim, a professor at Arizona State University and a co-author on the paper, said in a statement.
The find was dubbed a "diamond factory" by Arizona State University.
The interior of the Earth is divided into several segments, all composed of different ingredients and states of matter. Underneath the thin rocky crust comes the mantle, a slow-moving layer of molten rocks making up 84% of the planet's total volume, according to National Geographic. It sits at between 1,832 degrees F and 6,692 degrees F. Further in comes the Earth's outer and inner core: the outer core is liquid iron and nickel, among other elements, and is around 9,000 degrees F, while the inner core is mostly made of solid iron, due to the intense pressures, and is about as hot as the surface of the sun.
The authors of the paper have measured how carbon in the liquid outer core comes out of the liquid iron metal alloy, reacts with water, and forms diamonds.
"Temperature at the boundary between the silicate mantle and the metallic core at [around 1,800 miles] depth reaches to [about 7,000 degrees Fahrenheit], which is sufficiently high for most minerals to lose H2O captured in their atomic-scale structures," Shim said.
"At the pressures expected for the Earth's core-mantle boundary, hydrogen alloying with iron metal liquid appears to reduce solubility of other light elements in the core. Therefore, solubility of carbon, which likely exists in the Earth's core, decreases locally where hydrogen enters into the core from the mantle (through dehydration)."
"So the carbon escaping from the liquid outer core would become diamond when it enters into the mantle."
Diamonds are made entirely from carbon atoms in a uniquely strong arrangement of chemical bonds. They can be found in the crust across the planet, but are incredibly rare and therefore expensive. Diamonds are thought to have been transported from their origins in the mantle to the Earth's surface via deep-source volcanic eruptions.
The hardest known substance, the diamond, is used in industry for cutting and abrasion, as well as being a revered and symbolic jewelry gemstone.
"Carbon is an essential element for life and plays an important role in many geological processes. The new discovery of a carbon transfer mechanism from the core to the mantle will shed light on the understanding of the carbon cycle in the Earth's deep interior," Byeongkwan Ko, a recent Arizona State University PhD graduate and co-author of the paper, said in a statement. "This is even more exciting given that the diamond formation at the core-mantle boundary might have been going on for billions of years since the initiation of subduction on the planet."
Diamonds and rust at the Earth's core-mantle boundary
Scientists in ASU’s School of Earth and Space Exploration help discover that a potential “diamond factory” may have existed at Earth’s core-mantle boundary for billions of years
Peer-Reviewed PublicationSteel rusts by water and air on the Earth’s surface. But what about deep inside the Earth’s interior?
The Earth’s core is the largest carbon storage on Earth – roughly 90% is buried there. Scientists have shown that the oceanic crust that sits on top of tectonic plates and falls into the interior, through subduction, contains hydrous minerals and can sometimes descend all the way to the core-mantle boundary. The temperature at the core-mantle boundary is at least twice as hot as lava, and high enough that water can be released from the hydrous minerals. Therefore, a chemical reaction similar to rusting steel could occur at Earth’s core-mantle boundary.
Byeongkwan Ko, a recent Arizona State University PhD graduate, and his collaborators published their findings on the core-mantle boundary in Geophysical Research Letters. They conducted experiments at the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory, where they compressed iron-carbon alloy and water together to the pressure and temperature expected at the Earth’s core-mantle boundary, melting the iron-carbon alloy.
The researchers found that water and metal react and make iron oxides and iron hydroxides, just like what happens with rusting at Earth’s surface. However, they found that for the conditions of the core-mantle boundary carbon comes out of the liquid iron-metal alloy and forms diamond.
“Temperature at the boundary between the silicate mantle and the metallic core at 3,000 km depth reaches to roughly 7,000 F, which is sufficiently high for most minerals to lose H2O captured in their atomic scale structures,” said Dan Shim, professor at ASU’s School of Earth and Space Exploration. “In fact, the temperature is high enough that some minerals should melt at such conditions.”
Because carbon is an iron loving element, significant carbon is expected to exist in the core, while the mantle is thought to have relatively low carbon. However, scientists have found that much more carbon exists in the mantle than expected.
“At the pressures expected for the Earth's core-mantle boundary, hydrogen alloying with iron metal liquid appears to reduce solubility of other light elements in the core,” said Shim. “Therefore, solubility of carbon, which likely exists in the Earth's core, decreases locally where hydrogen enters into the core from the mantle (through dehydration). The stable form of carbon at the pressure-temperature conditions of Earth's core-mantle boundary is diamond. So the carbon escaping from the liquid outer core would become diamond when it enters into the mantle.”
“Carbon is an essential element for life and plays an important role in many geological processes,” said Ko. “The new discovery of a carbon transfer mechanism from the core to the mantle will shed light on the understanding of the carbon cycle in the Earth’s deep interior. This is even more exciting given that the diamond formation at the core-mantle boundary might have been going on for billions of years since the initiation of subduction on the planet.”
Ko's new study shows that carbon leaking from the core into the mantle by this diamond formation process may supply enough carbon to explain the elevated carbon amounts in the mantle. Ko and his collaborators also predicted that diamond rich structures can exist at the core-mantle boundary and that seismic studies might detect the structures because seismic waves should travel unusually fast for the structures.
“The reason that seismic waves should propagate exceptionally fast through diamond-rich structures at the core-mantle boundary is because diamond is extremely incompressible and less dense than other materials at the core-mantle boundary,” said Shim.
Ko and team will continue investigating how the reaction can also change the concentration of other light elements in the core, such as silicon, sulfur and oxygen, and how such changes can impact the mineralogy of the deep mantle.
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Author: Andrea Chatwood, Communications Specialist, ASU The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
JOURNAL
Geophysical Research Letters
METHOD OF RESEARCH
Observational study
SUBJECT OF RESEARCH
Not applicable
ARTICLE TITLE
Water-induced diamond formation at Earth's core-mantle boundary
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