Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – New research has discovered an 18-kilometer-thick layer of diamond beneath the surface of Mercury, the smallest planet in the solar system and the closest to the sun.
The diamond was probably formed after Mercury became a planet about 4.5 billion years ago. The planet itself is made up of clouds of dust and gas moving in a ‘vessel’ of high pressure and high temperature.
Currently, the young planet is believed to have a graphite crust, which floats on a deep ocean of magma.
A team of researchers recreated the ‘crucible’ in an experiment, with a device called an anvil press which is usually used to study how materials behave under great pressure but also to make synthetic diamonds.
“This is a very large press, which allows us to place small samples at the same pressures and temperatures that we would expect inside Mercury’s mantle, at the boundary between the mantle and the core,” said Bernard Charlier, one of the study’s authors. .
The team synthetically mixed various elements, including silicon, titanium, magnesium, and aluminum, in graphite capsules, which resemble the theoretical composition of Mercury’s interior.
The researchers then exposed the capsule to pressures nearly 70,000 times greater than those found on Earth’s surface and temperatures of up to 2,000 degrees Celsius, replicating the conditions found near the core of Mercury long ago. billions of years.
After melting the samples, the scientists observed chemical and mineral changes under an electron microscope and noted that the graphite had turned into diamond crystals.
This equipment, the researchers say, could not only give us more insight into the secrets hidden under the surface of Mercury, but also the evolution of planets and the internal structure of exoplanets with similar properties.
Mysterious Mercury
Mercury is the second most populous planet after Earth. Its massive metallic core occupies 85% of the radius of Mercury, and it is also the smallest terrestrial planet studied in the solar system.
The last completed mission to Mercury, NASA’s MESSENGER, orbited the planet between March 2011 and April 2015. It collected data on the planet’s geology, chemistry and magnetic field, before the spacecraft ran out. of fuel and that she fell to the surface.
“We know that there is a lot of carbon in the form of graphite on the surface of Mercury, but not much research has been done on the interior of the planet,” said Yanhao Lin, a scientist at the Advanced Research Center of High Pressure Science and Technology Beijing and co-author of the study in the journal Nature Communications.
“Compared to the Moon or Mars, we don’t know much about Mercury, also because we don’t have samples from the planet’s surface,” said Charlier.
Mercury is different from all other terrestrial planets, because it is very close to the sun and has very little oxygen, which affects its chemistry.
Regarding diamonds, he said that the thickness of the diamond layer between 15 and 18 kilometers is only an estimate, and that could change because the process of creating diamonds is still going on as Mercury’s core continues to grow. cooling down.
It is also impossible for researchers to know how big the diamonds are.
“We have no idea of their size, but diamonds are only made of carbon, so they should look like what we know on Earth about their composition. They should look like pure diamonds,” he explained.
It is also impossible to mine the diamonds, even with more advanced technology in the future, because the diamonds are at a depth of about 500 kilometers.
However, some of the lava on Mercury’s surface has formed by melting the deep mantle. “It is reasonable to think that this process could bring some diamonds to the surface, depending on what happens on Earth,” he concluded.
(fab/fab)
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