Researchers proposed a model with a 70-year rotation cycle of our planet’s iron heart, and report that we’re in the middle of one of its big shift

Earth’s Inner Core: A Shifting, Spinning Mystery’s Latest Twist

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2023-01-31 06:00:08

Researchers proposed a model with a 70-year rotation cycle of our planet’s iron heart, and report that we’re in the middle of one of its big shifts.

Imagine Earth’s inner core — the dense center of our planet — as a heavy, metal ballerina. This iron-rich dancer is capable of pirouetting at ever-changing speeds.

That core may be on the cusp of a big shift. Seismologists reported Monday in the journal Nature Geoscience that after brief but peculiar pauses, the inner core changes how it spins — relative to the motion of Earth’s surface — perhaps once every few decades. And, right now, one such reversal may be underway.

This may sound like a setup for a world-wrecking, blockbuster movie. But fret not: Precisely nothing apocalyptic will result from this planetary spin cycle, which may have been happening for eons. The researchers who propose this speculative model instead aim to advance understanding of Earth’s innermost sanctum and its relationship with the rest of the world.

The inner core is like “a planet within a planet, so how it moves is obviously very important,” said Xiaodong Song, a seismologist at Peking University in Beijing and an author of the study.

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