Michigan Earth Professor Jie (Jackie) Li was recently featured in Mashable India's article "The Earth's Core Is Wilder Than You Can Imagine." The article summarizes everything that makes our planet's center so incredible. Read the snippet below for Dr. Li's quote.
Around 1,800 miles beneath your feet lies a giant, blazing-hot ball of metal. It's the innermost part of our planet, Earth's core. It has a profound impact on your life, though none of us can even glimpse this impossibly remote, hostile place. The core is about the size of Pluto, yet scientists found that distant world in our solar system nearly a century ago, before discovering proof of the core.
"The mantle is basically a thick jacket. It doesn't allow the core to cool very fast," explained Jie Li, a geophysicist at the University of Michigan.
Other factors, too, help keep the core torrid, such as the crystallization of Earth's solid inner core, a long-ago process that also releases heat. It's crucial that the core is hot because these temperatures help create the environment that maintains Earth's vital magnetic field. "Vital" might be an understatement.
Read the full article by Mark Kaufman from Mashable India HERE
