Scientists discover jet stream within the earth’s molten iron core using the latest satellite data that helps to create an X-ray view of the planet.
Wondering what Jet Stream is? Jet streams are fast flowing, narrow, meandering air currents found in the atmosphere of some planets, including Earth.
Researchers found that jet streams are located with a boundary between two different regions in the core. It is caused by the liquid present in the core moving towards the boundary which then squeezed out sideways.
“The European Space Agency’s Swarm satellites are providing our sharpest X-ray image yet of the core. We have not only seen this jet stream clearly for the first time, but we understand why it is here,” Phil livermore from the University of Leeds, lead researcher, said.
“We can explain it is an accelerating band of molten iron circling the North Pole, like the jet stream in the atmosphere,” Livermore said.
“Because of the core’s remote location under about 1,900 miles (3,000 kilometers) of rock. So Scientists study it indirectly by measuring the planets’s magnetic field. For instance, changes in the magnetic field suggested that liquid iron in the outer core moves faster in the Northern Hemisphere, largely beneath Alaska and Siberia,” the researchers said.
However, new data from the Swarm satellites has shown that these changes are actually caused by a jet stream, which moves about 25 miles (40 kilometers) per year, currently in a westward direction, the researchers found.
That speed is three times faster than normal outer-core speeds, and hundreds of thousands of time faster than the rate at which Earth’s tectonic plates moves, they noted.
The European Space Agency’s Swarm mission features a trio of satellites which simultaneously measure and untangle the different magnetic signals which stem from Earth’s core, mantle, crust, oceans, ionosphere and magnetosphere. They have provided the clearest information yet about the magnetic field created in the core.
Swarm’s data also allowed the researchers to pinpoint the jet stream’s location: It flows along a boundary between two different regions in the core, the researchers found. This movement from both sides, and then is squeezed out sideways, they said.
“Of course, you need a force to move the liquid toward the boundary,” said study co-author Rainer Hollerbach, a professor of theoretical fluid dynamics at the school of Mathematics at the University of Leeds. “This could be provided by buoyancy, or perhaps more likely from changes in the magnetic field within the core.
“We know more about the sun than the Earth’s core. The discovery of this jet is an exciting step in learning more about our planet’s inner workings,” Chris Finlay from the Technical University of Denmark, said.
