Helium-3, a rare helium gas station, emerges from Earth’s center, a new study reports. Because almost all helium-3 comes from the Big Bang, gas leaks add to the evidence that the Earth is formed inside the solar and nebulae, which has long been debated.
Helium-3 is rated on Earth in relatively small quantities. But scientists did not know how many leaks in the center of the Earth, unlike their central layers, called the mantle. Some natural processes can produce helium-3, such as tritium decomposition, but helium-3 is mainly made up of solar nebulae – large, circulating clouds of gas and dust like the ones that created our Solar System. Because helium is one of the first to be produced in the universe, more helium-3 can be traced back to the Big Bang.
As the planet grows, it accumulates information from its surroundings, so its structure reflects the environment in which it is built. To achieve high helium-3 concentrations deep in the heart, the Earth would have to form within the solar and prosperous planet, not on its edges or during its deteriorating phase.
New research trails
New research adds further clues to the structure of the earth, providing further evidence to the theory that our planet formed within the solar and nebulae. The study was published in the AGU journal Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems, which publishes research on chemistry, and physics, geology, and Earth biology and planetary processes.
Nearly 2,000 grams of helium-3 leaks into the Earth each year, “almost enough to fill a balloon the size of your desk,” says lead researcher Peter Olson, a natural scientist at the University of New Mexico. “It is a natural wonder, and an indication of the history of the Earth, that there is still a significant amount of this isotope within the Earth.”
Researchers equate helium with two important phases of Earth’s history: the original formation, when the planet accumulates helium, and the subsequent formation of the Moon, after which helium was lost. Evidence suggests that a third of the size of the Earth hit the planet early in its history, about 4 billion years ago and that impact would have also melted Earth’s crust, allowing much of the helium to escape. Gas continues to flow to this day.
Using a modern leak level of helium-3 and helium isotope behavioral models, the researchers estimated that there were between 10 teraphim (1013 grams) to petagram (1015 grams) of helium-3 in the center – a large number mentioned by Olson. points to the formation of the Earth within the solar nebula, where high gas levels would allow it to form at the depths of the planet. of the spine as a source, Olson said “There are more mysteries than certainty”
Source Journal Reference:Peter L. Olson, Zachary D. Sharp. Primordial Helium‐3 Exchange Between Earth’s Core and Mantle. Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems, 2022; 23 (3) DOI: 10.1029/2021GC009985
READ MORE : Melting ice may not block the flow of seawater
