What has the study found?
Evidence of the sixth ocean was discovered while analysing a rare diamond that had taken form 660 km inside the Earth. This has confirmed a long-time theory that ocean water accompanies subducting slabs, and thus enters the transition zone. Subduction is a geological process in which the oceanic lithosphere of a tectonic plate converges with the less dense lithosphere of a second plate, the denser plate dives under the second plate and sinks into the mantle.
"These mineral transformations greatly hinder the movements of rock in the mantle," explains Prof. Frank Brenker from the Institute for Geosciences at Goethe University in Frankfurt. "The subducting slabs also carry deep-sea sediments piggyback into the Earth's interior. These sediments can hold large quantities of water and CO2. Until now, it was unclear just how much enters the transition zone in the form of more stable, hydrous minerals and carbonates, and whether large quantities of water are really stored there."
How Useful Is The Air Quality Index?
