Massive New Ocean Discovered Deep Inside Earth's Interior

Scientists using 3-D scanning of the deep interior of Earth have found evidence of a vast water reservoir beneath eastern Asia that is at least the volume of the Arctic Ocean -the first time such a large body of water has found in the planet’s deep mantle.

The finding, made by Michael Wysession, a seismologist at Washington University in St. Louis, and his former graduate student Jesse Lawrence, now at the University of California, San Diego, was made by
analyzing more than 600,000 seismograms—records of waves generated by earthquakes traveling through the Earth—collected from instruments located around the planet.

The team discovered a region beneath Asia where seismic waves appeared to dampen, or “attenuate,” and also slow down slightly. “Water slows the speed of waves,” Wysession explained. “Lots of damping and a little slowing match the predictions for water very well.”

Their research proved out earlier predictions that calculated that if a cold slab of the ocean floor were to sink thousands of miles into the Earth’s mantle, the hot temperatures would cause water stored inside the rock to evaporate out.

The researchers estimate that up to 0.1 percent of the rock sinking down into the Earth’s mantle in that part of the world is water, which works out to about an Arctic Ocean’s worth of water.

Wysession has dubbed the new underground feature the “Beijing anomaly,” because seismic wave attenuation was found to be highest beneath the Chinese capital city (see image left above showing increased attenuation in Asia) . Wysession first used the moniker during a presentation of his work at the University of Beijing.

“They thought it was very, very interesting,” Wysession said. “China is under greater seismic risk than just about any country in the world, so they are very interested in seismology.”

Water covers 70 percent of Earth’s surface and one of its many functions is to act like a lubricant for the movement of continental plates.

“Look at our sister planet, Venus,” Wysession said. “It is very hot and dry inside Venus, and Venus has no plate tectonics. All the water probably boiled off, and without water, there are no plates. The system is locked up, like a rusty Tin Man with no oil.”

Posted by Jason McManus.

Related Galaxy posts:

Life from the Center of the Earth - Our Hidden
Is There Life on Mars? NASA Goes Underground to Find Out
What Lies Beneath -A Mystery at the Earth's Center
Unknown Species of the Underworld Discovered

Link:

http://news-info.wustl.edu/news/page/normal/8222.html

 

Comments

[Barrie O'Leary]

Oh dear! Daily Galaxy has given Creationist c-r-a-p a bumper boost
here with this underground ocean nonsense. At last they can 'prove' where all the water necessary for Noah's flood came from. Must have been expelled by all that steam and then sunk back in, eh?
If there is water of this extent,
then it infills porous rocks or
cracks of non-porous rocks. It cannot exist under the oceans and
the under-ice Lake "Vodka" of the Antarctic is a staggering repetition of water freezing over lakes and lagoons so typical of the northern hemisphere during winter. There is no connection. There is no subsurface ocean of water. There is no connection to Jupiter's Io. B.S. has no place in a grand journal such as this.

Submitted by Barrie O'Leary, Queensland.

________________________________

[Barrie O'Leary]

Oh dear! Daily Galaxy has given Creationist c-r-a-p a bumper boost
here with this underground ocean nonsense. At last they can 'prove' where all the water necessary for Noah's flood came from. Must have been expelled by all that steam and then sunk back in, eh?
If there is water of this extent,
then it infills porous rocks or
cracks of non-porous rocks. It cannot exist under the oceans and
the under-ice Lake "Vodka" of the Antarctic is a staggering repetition of water freezing over lakes and lagoons so typical of the northern hemisphere during winter. There is no connection. There is no subsurface ocean of water. There is no connection to Jupiter's Io. B.S. has no place in a grand journal such as this.

Submitted by Barrie O'Leary, Queensland.

________________________________

[Skip]

And God said, let it rain.

[jeff]

Grand Journal, Barrie?

[mario]

To Barrie the smartass:
I can prove conclusively there was a worldwide flood of biblical proportions.
Question:
-What is the origin of all oil, coal and natural gas deposits?
Answer: decayed plant and animal matter.
Question: How did it get there in such quantities?
Answer: Certainly not by normal continual deposits like in a forest. Go to any forest or jungle and dig down a few feet and you get rock, sand or clay. Decayed matter is reused in the ecosystem.
If this is so, please explain an oil field two miles wide and two miles deep with decayed plant and animal matter (oil). All that plant and animal matter was deposited as the waters receded and covered by sediment.
No other explanation.
Want more proof?
Almost ALL dinosaur fossils are in sedimentary rock. It is the only way to preserve bones.
If a deer dies in the woods, will it turn into a fossil?
No. Why? It will disappear by other animals and weather.
So how do we account for all those fossils?
You see Barrie, there are many ways to look at things.

[Leon Howell]

Notice the difference between these two posts.

The evolutionist uses mockery and ridicule to make his "point", but doesn't offer any evidence.

The creationist gives a list of well known and easily proven facts that no one can really argue with, and comes to a logical conclution based on those facts.

Where are your facts, Barrie?

[Hummer]

Jeff, your post got me thinking, if an oil field is two miles deep, and represents the concentration of the organic oil contained in vegetable matter after the decay and dissolution of the greenery, than how much, or rather how deep would the plant matter have had to be to produce the oil field you referenced?

[Frank John Holmquist]

Why does the Jupiter moon Eo have oceans and rivers and lakes of petrolium? Why do all the ancient records descibe the birth of Mars and Venus as occuring via the forehead of Jupiter and emerging with the twin tails or horns that led to the cult of the sacred cow around the world. Ever hear of the second earth one AU on the opposite side of the sun? Why is PUtin going after the north and south poles? Hollow earth acess?? Remember Admiral Byrd flying into the hole in the north pole and encountering giant ferns and giant lizzards. If you were driven out of the vacuum of space, where would you hide from the light?? Ever hear of Immanuel Vehlikovsky? popul Vu, Bamboo books, Egyptian books of the dead, Vishnu...etc.etc What happened happened to the whole world in the past is getting ready to happen again...
end of the 5th or 7th age of the sun/earth...Life on earth goes in full ccircles.... Frank

[Koivisto]

The oil is evidence of a massive polar shift and the moving of earths crust. The ancient myths state it, and it is backed up by oil and frozen plants and animals in the antarctic. Do your homework.

[Holy Crap]

Holy canoli you creationists really need a friggin' edumication in geology....

"Go to any forest or jungle and dig down a few feet and you get rock, sand or clay. Decayed matter is reused in the ecosystem."

I see, so these forests you have been to represent the ONLY possible depositional environment and it has not changed throughout earth's history? Come on man... Among a boat load of other examples, how about an anoxic lake or swamp? Open a text book....

"Almost ALL dinosaur fossils are in sedimentary rock. It is the only way to preserve bones."

Correction...ALL (not almost) fossils are preserved in what was atleast at one time sedimentary rock. How the hell else do you propose preservation to occur?!? That fossiliferous rock may have experienced post-depositional deformation/metamorphism, but that's another story....

"So how do we account for all those fossils?"

I like this one...you seem to be implying that fossil preservation was an exceedingly common process. Throughout the hundreds of millions of years of life on earth, circumstances were right here and there to preserve a foot print or a skeleton or a shell once in a while...sure but every individual certainly was not preserved. Only a very small % happened to be in the right place at the right time.

Now, that being said, please go to your church and stay out of our schools, government, and public places in general.

Thanks,
Concerned Citizen