Alan Buis 818-354-0474 Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. Alan.buis@jpl.nasa.gov
INTERNET ADVISORY: 2009-105 July 1, 2009
Earthquakes, From Above and Below: Live Chat
Earthquakes: they're among the most frightening and deadly of all natural disasters. A live videocast and chat from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., will give viewers an opportunity to ask questions of NASA scientists who are using space-based technologies to advance our understanding of these mysterious phenomena.
The live event will air on the "NASAJPL" channel available on Ustream TV at: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nasajpl on Monday, July 6, beginning at 5 p.m. PDT (8 p.m. EDT and 2400 UTC).
Scientists use a broad array of tools to study earthquakes and their processes from the ground, air and space. Space-based technologies like those being developed at JPL can image minute Earth movements to within fractions of an inch, measuring the ground deforming along faults before and after earthquakes. Among these tools are the Global Positioning System, interferometric synthetic aperture radar, and the latest technology JPL is now using to map major California earthquake faults: the Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle Synthetic Aperture Radar, or UAVSAR. JPL scientists are also applying complex computer models to simulate earthquake processes.
Participants include:
Andrea Donnellan, JPL geophysicist and program area lead for natural disasters in NASA Headquarters' Science Mission Directorate, Washington Maggi Glasscoe, JPL geophysicist Viewers may submit questions over Ustream or via Twitter. Twitter users may send their questions to @NASAJPL using the hashtag #quakechat .
In addition, if you are unable to take part in the live chat, you may submit questions in advance to chatquestion@jpl.nasa.gov and watch the archived video at a later time.
ScienceDaily (Aug. 20, 2009) — As tags on household appliances warn, water conducts electricity extremely well. Now, scientists have found that enhanced electrical conductivity in parts of Earth's mantle may signal the presence of water far below our planet's surface.
The researchers created the first global three-dimensional map of electrical conductivity in the mantle. Results of their study are published this week in the journal Nature.
The areas of high conductivity coincide with subduction zones--places where tectonic plates are being subducted beneath the Earth's crust, say the Oregon State University (OSU) scientists who performed the research. They used electromagnetic induction sounding of the Earth's mantle in the study. The method is very sensitive to interconnecting pockets of fluid in rocks and minerals.
"This work is important because it complements global 3-D seismic imaging of Earth's interior, which uses sound waves generated by earthquakes," said Robin Reichlin, program director in the National Science Foundation (NSF)'s Division of Earth Sciences, which funded the research. "Scientists may be able to combine these two methods to tease out a more detailed understanding of variations in Earth's inner composition, water content and temperature."
Subducting plates are comparatively colder than surrounding mantle materials and should be less conductive, geologists have believed. However, the OSU scientists suggest, conductivity in these areas may be enhanced by water drawn downward during the subduction process.
"Many earth scientists thought that tectonic plates are not likely to carry much, if any, water deep into the Earth's mantle," said Adam Schultz, a geologist at OSU and a co-author of the Nature paper. "Our model, however, clearly shows a close association between subduction zones and high conductivity. The simplest explanation is water."
The study provides new insights into the fundamental ways in which our planet works, Schultz says. Despite advances in technology, scientists are still unsure how much water lies beneath the ocean floor--and how much of it makes its way into the mantle.
The implications are myriad. Water interacts with minerals differently at different depths, and small amounts of water may change the physical properties of rocks, alter the viscosity of materials in the mantle, assist in the formation of rising plumes of melted rock, and ultimately affect what flows out on the surface.
"In fact, we don't really know how much water there is on Earth," said Gary Egbert, an oceanographer at OSU and co-author of the paper. "There is some evidence that there is many times more water below the ocean floor than there is in all the oceans of the world combined. Our results may shed some light on this question."
There may be different explanations for how the water--if indeed the conductivity is reflecting water--got there.
"If it isn't being subducted down with the plates," Schultz said, "is it primordial, down there for four billion years? Or did it come down as the plates slowly subduct, suggesting that the planet may have been much wetter a long time ago? These are fascinating questions for which we don't yet have answers."
Anna Kelbert, a post-doctoral researcher at OSU and lead author of the paper, says that the next step is to replicate the experiment with newly available data from both ground observatories and satellites, then conduct further research to better understand the water cycle and how its interaction with deep-Earth minerals works.
Ultimately, the scientists hope to produce a model quantifying how much water may be in the mantle, locked up in its rocks.
Their work is also supported by NASA.
keeha
Re: Scientists Create First Three-dimensional Global Map Of Elec
Science would be much better served if the writers talked about the experiment and results rather than just taking a headline and pontificating about favourite delusions. The article ends up being all about water.
Based on lab measurements at CNRS's CEMHTI, the researchers established the high conductivity of molten carbonates. Their conductivity is 1000 times higher than that of basalt, which was previously thought to be the only potential conductor in the mantle. Fabrice Gaillard and his team have shown that the conductivity of the Earth's mantle is a result of the presence of small amounts of molten carbonates between chunks of solid rock.
Florian
Re: Scientists Create First Three-dimensional Global Map Of Elec
keeha wrote: Science would be much better served if the writers talked about the experiment and results rather than just taking a headline and pontificating about favourite delusions. The article ends up being all about water.
Based on lab measurements at CNRS's CEMHTI, the researchers established the high conductivity of molten carbonates. Their conductivity is 1000 times higher than that of basalt, which was previously thought to be the only potential conductor in the mantle. Fabrice Gaillard and his team have shown that the conductivity of the Earth's mantle is a result of the presence of small amounts of molten carbonates between chunks of solid rock.
So true. I had the very same article about carbonates in mind when I read that paper in Nature.
Anaconda
Re: Scientists Create First Three-dimensional Global Map Of Elec
Florian wrote:
keeha wrote: Science would be much better served if the writers talked about the experiment and results rather than just taking a headline and pontificating about favourite delusions. The article ends up being all about water.
Based on lab measurements at CNRS's CEMHTI, the researchers established the high conductivity of molten carbonates. Their conductivity is 1000 times higher than that of basalt, which was previously thought to be the only potential conductor in the mantle. Fabrice Gaillard and his team have shown that the conductivity of the Earth's mantle is a result of the presence of small amounts of molten carbonates between chunks of solid rock.
So true. I had the very same article about carbonates in mind when I read that paper in Nature.
Of course, what this really shows is that the mantel is conductive of electrical current and that electrical current concentrates in specific areas.
What is not answered by this article and the profiled paper is what causes the electromagnetic conductivity and what drives the electric current?
What do I mean by that?
Water as the conductive material is an assumption — it could be right, in fact there is scientific evidence to support this idea, but there are plenty of other minerals that are conductive of electromagnetism (carbonates increase electric conductivity, too, as the, above, linked article from ScienceDaily shows).
And what causes the electric current to flow is not even addressed by the article.
We, here, at the Electric Universe Forum know that electric currents within the Earth are part of larger electric circuits.
Also, as, perhaps, florian knows there is precious little actual scientific evidence to support the idea of "subduction" at all.
The idea that the Earth expands or grows was ruled out from the beginning as preposterous on its face (by the leading lights of geology), so, when mid-ocean expanding ridges were discovered under the Earth's oceans (approximately 40,000 miles of mid-ocean expanding ridges the world-over), it was quickly assumed that an equal amount of so-called "subduction" zones existed as well. The evidence for this assumption has always been tenuous at best, but a strong ideological preference against an expanding Earth, and a process of one geology paper citing a previous one for justification of "subduction" (group-think), has led to many dead-ends for geology and an iron-clad assumption that "subduction" exists and that the Earth's diameter remains constant despite a plethora of scientific evidence that the Earth has and does expand in diameter.
But the question remains unanswered: What causes these meetings of tectonic plates to have higher electromagnetic conductivity than other places?
Let me suggest that it is a combination of structure (physical conditions) and the minerals present in the structures (water could be one of them) that causes this higher electrical conductivity.
But let me also suggest that the physical structure promotes electrical conductivity, but once electrical conductivity is confirmed, i.e., electrical current is observed & measured, it may well turn out that the electrical current causes physical chemical reactions to act as a positive feedback loop that increases the electrical conductivity of the structure.
How so?
Electrical current, pressure, and temperature results in chemical reactions which produce chemical molecules that are more conductive of electric current (there are some roughly 4000 minerals, many run in similar families of minerals).
Also, more controversially, electric current and pressure and temperature cause transmutation of chemical elements into other chemical elements generally with more protons, neutrons, and electrons.
The classic example of this transmutation is the element Sulphur, which has been associated with lightning strikes as a resultant smell by the likes of people such as Benjamin Franklin and other electrical pioneers over the centuries, plus, a sulphurous smell being reported numerous times by first-hand witnesses of lightning strikes from all walks of life.
Sulphur is also a mineral commonly associated with volcanic action which is associated with tectonic boundaries.
And as the related ScienceDaily article cited suggests carbonates also cause an increase of conductivity of electrical currents.
Of course, carbonates could be building blocks of hydrocarbons and sulphur is a common mineral associated with hydrocarbons in geological formations.
Could there be a connection between all these disparate facts?
And could this connection be electromagnetism and electric currents flowing into and out of the Earth?
On this forum, that would not be a surprising conclusion, but most of Science has yet to reach this conclusion, but perhaps, by observation & measurement like the one profiled in ScienceDaily will spur conventional science to revisit its underlying basic assumptions.
Just don't hold your breath waiting
Florian
Re: Scientists Create First Three-dimensional Global Map Of Elec
I think that the explanation is simpler than that. The so called "subduction zones" are shear zones. They are the edge of a rising flow of mantle material. Why that upward flow? Because the matter that somehow accumulate in side Earth is redistributed toward the surface according to its buoyancy. Among these materials are a lot of light elements that form the volatile we know (CO2, H2O...), the same volatiles that increase the conductivity in the mantle. So it is expected that zones of rising flows (subduction zones) are more conductive.
Now your suggestion that transmutation occurs inside earth is very important. Indeed, we have two major questions with the growing earth theory:
The first one is: where does all that matter come from? By matter I mean protons and electrons. Either they directly arrive inside Earth as protons and electrons (e.g. as Birkeland currents). But is the flow of particles sufficiently high, on average over million years, to fuel the growth? Or there is a source of energy that condenses into protons and electrons (baryogenesis).
The second one is: how do you get so many elements of the periodic table from protons and electrons, i.e. hydrogen ? Obviously, you need transmutation here. Interestingly there are some research from russian scientists (and others) showing that when electrical current flows through a fine titanium wire immersed in water in a closed vessel (so that presure build up inside the vessel). There is transmutation of large amounts of titanium into copper. This suggests that the combination of confinement and electric discharge leads to transmutation of elements. Such situation might happen in the mantle and that would solve one of the two big questions
Re: Scientists Create First Three-dimensional Global Map Of Elec
Well what I think is neat, is that I had surmised elsewhere that 'fault zones' were nothing more than telluric 'circuits' and that earthquakes were akin to underground lightning.
This sounds like I was at least barking up the right tree!
Mike H.
MGmirkin
Re: Scientists Create First Three-dimensional Global Map Of Elec
Anaconda wrote: We, here, at the Electric Universe Forum know that electric currents within the Earth are part of larger electric circuits.
But we also know about piezoelectricity and the work of Friedmann Freund @ NASA (Ames Research Center)... Talking about p-holes (positive holes are largely talked about in semiconductor physics, but now seem applicable to geology too?) and such with respect to earthquakes and tectonic stresses. So, it may not be that all cases of flowing currents are specifically externally supplied. There may be mechanical forces at work that also generate currents locally, etc.
Re: Scientists Create First Three-dimensional Global Map Of Elec
I was wondering-there were magnetometers strung along the San Andreas Fault, perhaps 40 years ago. They were supposed to monitor the magnetic field, as part of earthquake studies. Where did they go?
Florian
Re: Scientists Create First Three-dimensional Global Map Of Elec
I found a paper on arxiv describing the theory and how it is confirmed exprimentally.
G. Lochak "The equation of a Light Leptonic Magnetic Monopole and its Experimental Aspects." Here is the link to the paper: http://arxiv.org/pdf/0801.2752v1
If you're not to much interested in physics theory you can go directly to the experiments section 15 page 16.
moses
Re: Scientists Create First Three-dimensional Global Map Of Elec
Re http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/0801/0801.2752.pdf Thanks Florian. Reduction of the half-life time of β emitters by magnetic monopoles. Uranium enrichment. Solar monopoles that could follow the earth magnetic lines. Widespread transmutation products. Strange tracks on dectectors.
Huge article, just skip the theory. Mo
Kapriel
Re: Scientists Create First Three-dimensional Global Map Of Elec
A note to the tectonics-comment earlier:
I know this will probably sound just plain silly-- But if this immense, convective, BOYANT mass of magma is really circulating just below the crust, and will rise boyantly to the surface the second the crust is perforated, then why hasn't it continued to pour forth from the many perforations (volcanos) we already have, until the entire ocean is filled with lava, and the center of the Earth is drained dry of magma?
You may say it's the lack of pressure, that the pressure builds up and when it is released then the erruptions should cease. But I disagree. That is illogical reasoning. We're talking boyancy here, right? Ok, you say, then what about isostasis? And I say "what about it?" Isostacy supposedly explains why continental plates cannot subduct beneath oceanic ones. But...we have no real proof that anything has ever subducted anywhere, or that anything is doing so now. Too many holes in these theories. Just leaves me scratching my head, that's all...
Floyd415
My prof the other day said that on Jan (11?) 2006 there was a seismic event recorded, within 11 minutes, around the world. He also said that there isn't really a theory to explain this event and no one is really talking about it. I searched a bit on google, but couldn't find anything in reference to it.
Does anyone on these forums know anything about it?
bboyer
Re: Jan 2006 worldwide seismic event?
Your professor's remark is too vague to be meaningful, except for perhaps solely intending to generate mystery.
An additional few hits regarding (alleged?) N. Korea's 2006 testing of underground nukes (May, Oct were the months I saw mentioned offhand in a quick browse).
MGmirkin
Re: Jan 2006 worldwide seismic event?
Closest I can find for January 2006 seem to be 2 events:
Do 2 earthquakes a trend really make? Maybe there are more. Dunno. But, there are always earthquakes of varying magnitude somewhere on Earth every single day. Granted most of them are lower than the threshold we'd notice them, if sitting above them on the ground (Mag. 1 or 2 quakes).
I guess I'd ask the professor for specific references to the dates, times, locations and magnitudes of the supposed world-wide quakes. Something more than a vague allusion.
