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  • Kansas Legislator Proposes Bill to Outlaw Sustainability Education
    A bill has been introduced in the Kansas legislature this week that would prohibit the promotion of ...Read more

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    Kansas Legislator Proposes Bill to Outlaw Sustainability Education

    A bill has been introduced in the Kansas legislature this week that would prohibit the promotion of sustainability. Here is a link to the one-page bill: http://www.kslegislature.org/li/b2013_14/measures/documents/hb2366_00_0000.pdf. See report on Bloomberg News.
  • Earth's Center Is 1,000 Degrees Hotter Than Previously Thought, Synchrotron X-Ray Experiment Shows
    Scientists have determined the temperature near the Earth’s center to be 6000 degrees Celsius, 1000 ...Read more

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    Earth's Center Is 1,000 Degrees Hotter Than Previously Thought, Synchrotron X-Ray Experiment Shows

    Scientists have determined the temperature near the Earth’s center to be 6000 degrees Celsius, 1000 degrees hotter than in a previous experiment run 20 years ago. These measurements confirm geophysical models that the temperature difference between the solid core and the mantle above, must be at least 1500 degrees to explain why the Earth has a magnetic field. For more information about this study, see the press release from the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility.
  • Ocean Volcanic Rocks Contain Samples of Recycled Crust
    Scientists have long believed that lava erupted from certain oceanic volcanoes contains materials fr...Read more

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    Ocean Volcanic Rocks Contain Samples of Recycled Crust

    Scientists have long believed that lava erupted from certain oceanic volcanoes contains materials from the early Earth’s crust. But decisive evidence for this phenomenon has proven elusive. New research from a team including Carnegie’s Erik Hauri demonstrates that oceanic volcanic rocks contain samples of recycled crust dating back to the Archean era 2.5 billion years ago. Their work is published in Nature. Oceanic crust sinks into the Earth’s mantle at so-called subduction zones, where two plates come together. Much of what happens to the crust during this journey is unknown. Model-dependent studies for how long subducted material can exist in the mantle are uncertain and evidence of very old crust returning to Earth’s surface via upwellings of magma has not been found until now. For more information about these results, see the press release from the Carnegie Institution.
This is an image of the surface of Pluto.
Image from: NASA

Pluto's Surface and Interior

Data from 1999 suggests that the surface of Pluto is made of two different parts. It has an icy part and a non-icy part (the non-icy part may be some sort of rock). Scientists are fairly certain the icy part is made of frozen nitrogen, but also contains smaller amounts of frozen carbon monoxide and methane.

Pluto is so far away that is it very hard to see the planet, so we can't yet tell how much of the surface is covered with ice, and how much is covered with something which is not ice (the possibly rocky part). It will take a mission to Pluto to sort some of these things out!

Scientists are certain that the surface of Pluto is good at reflecting light, which suggests that it is mostly made of the icy component - and that means Pluto's surface is mostly composed of nitrogen.

The interior of Pluto is probably similar to that of major icy moons such as Ganymede. (Pluto is actually smaller than Ganymede, even though Ganymede is a moon).

Last modified January 19, 2001 by Jennifer Bergman.

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