Thursday, June 21, 2007

Hole In Earth Gets Bigger

Just over year ago, from atop a Balinese volcano,Here Be Dragons started advocating that Black Holes could exist inside stars, planets, and even Earth:

"There have been several mysteries about the planet we live on. What causes Earth's internal heat, which has persisted for billions of years? What powers the "dynamo" of planetary magnetic fields? How could the planets coalesce from an orbiting disk of gas? If particles collide at orbital velocities they will not stick together unless they have the mass of mountains. The answer lies not in geology, but in cosmology.

"The Big Bang created billions upon billions of Black Holes. They formed from quantum fluctuations grown large by expansion of the Universe. They are the largest component of mass in the Universe, surrounding the galaxies with invisible haloes. Our own solar system contains hundreds of these tiny holes, and we have been ignorant of their existence.

"When the solar system was but a disk of gas, a number of singularities started orbiting in the disk. One of these objects was smaller than a proton, yet weighed as much as a mountain. Larger particles were attracted and stuck to it. The singularity was far too tiny to eat everything up, but the small amount that was swallowed made the rest grow red hot. Eventually a ball of rock formed with a hot centre. This was the birth of a planet.

"The singularity in Earth's core has the diameter of a grain of sand, and the mass of a moon. It has been giving off radiation for billions of years. The heat generated causes volcanoes to erupt, creates the continents, and forms hydrocarbons in Earth's interior. Our life and this planet would not exist without it. Even the petrol that fills your tank may be the byproduct of a small Black Hole!

"This singularity spins independently within Earth's core. By dragging part of the iron core along, it spins the "dynamo" generating a magnetic field. That is why Earth's magnetic poles are not aligned with the geographic poles, and why this field sometimes changes direction. Venus has no magnetic field because its core does not spin. Mercury has a magnetic field and is here predicted to have vulcanism, which our MESSENGER spacecraft will discover in 2011."

The bit about 2011 was wrong, for just last month observations confirmed that Mercury is Hot!

Now the Hole in the Earth is generating heat online. In a paper entitled Singular Sources of Energy in Stars and Planets someone named Zhilyaev argues for Black Holes inside stars and planets. Does he enjoy this blog? For some reason the idea has been missing from arxiv, but it has been spread in conference papers and elsewhere. It is good news that more people are getting the idea.

(All this science has created technology that could someday save lives. Today the environmental sensors were re-assembled in a smaller, cleaner package. This has led to some ideas for improving the navigational system, which means that expensive new parts must be ordered in a hurry. This is a very exciting time.)

The new Carnival of Space is here!

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4 Comments:

Blogger Kea said...

Oh, thanks for another interesting link. I hope you are still planning on coming to GRG18. They just told me I can give a poster presentation (funny - I'm used to giving talks at conferences - oh, well).

12:30 PM  
Blogger L. Riofrio said...

Kea, wonderful that you are presenting. It is very hard getting a talk slot these days, but any presentation of yours is a good one.

5:34 AM  
Blogger QUASAR9 said...

Hi Louise,
Do Black Holes really exist?

8:13 AM  
Anonymous diet for kidney disease said...

Hole in earth?

6:00 PM  

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