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Published on Jul 14, 2018 An experiment on how turbulent convection in Earth's core makes a magnetic field Get a free audiobook with a free 30 day trial at www.audible.com... or text Veritasium to 500-500 Huge thanks to Prof. Dan Lathrop and team: ve42.co... Companion video to explain Earth's magnetic fields in more detail: youtu.be...
I learned a lot in making this video and the one on my second channel with Prof. Jon Arnou. I changed a lot of my preconceptions, specifically I thought: 1. That the Earth's magnetic field was a passive thing - it shouldn't need a continuous input of energy to maintain itself (that seemed reasonable to me because the magnetic field has been around for a long time and it seems mostly stable). But as it turns out, the Earth is a giant electromagnet, and so of course those currents dissipate their energy as they encounter resistance in the liquid metal through which they flow. So the energy to continuously create these currents comes from the kinetic energy of the liquid metal flows in the Earth's outer core. 2. If it's convection, I'm thinking hot things rising, cooler things falling. But apparently the main effect driving convection is the compositional differences at the boundary with the Earth's inner core. This is because of the differential freezing at the boundary. Things like iron freeze into the inner core, while elements like sulfur do not. Hence the pockets of lighter material which then rise outwards. 3. I didn't get why the fluid motion was necessary for the generation of the magnetic field. I mean if it's a conducting liquid, it can conduct currents whether it moves or not. But the key is that the liquid metal can 'trap' magnetic fields. I imagine this like how iron channels magnetic fields. Then once these fields are channeled, they can be pulled and stretched, making more magnetic field. 4. Fluids operate very differently in rotating frames of reference. This is something I didn't intuitively grasp. But, as fluids move from the inner core outwards, those particles are moving much more slowly in the direction of rotation than the matter that has been there for a long time, which means the convection currents get deflected and form helices.
Maybe Cern has something to do with it
"There has been speculation that we are about to experience a magnetic polar reversal or excursion," says Richard Holme, co-author of the study. "However, by studying the two most recent excursion events, we show that neither bear resemblance to current changes in the geomagnetic field and therefore it is probably unlikely that such an event is about to happen. Our research suggests instead that the current weakened field will recover without such an extreme event, and therefore is unlikely to reverse."
There is also a known weak spot over South america Brazil I think ?
originally posted by: xBWOMPx
a reply to: Phage
I did not know this, thank you for the input...
QUICK, EVERYBODY, DESTROY YOUR REFRIGERATOR MAGNETS!!!
What? It's been a while since I had an MRI but my flesh stayed on my bones, as I recall.
You ever consider that 2 earth based magnets of strong enough power can tear flesh from your body if they catch it?
The weak force. Strong enough to hold everything together, delicately.
originally posted by: Phage
a reply to: SummerRain
What? It's been a while since I had an MRI but my flesh stayed on my bones, as I recall.
You ever consider that 2 earth based magnets of strong enough power can tear flesh from your body if they catch it?
The weak force. Strong enough to hold everything together, delicately.
Gravity? The weakest force, actually. But pervasive, and it seems to suffice.
He never said MRI's were strong enough to rip your flesh away
Did you see the question mark in my post?
he didn't mean gravity was a weak force
originally posted by: Phage
a reply to: xBWOMPx
He never said MRI's were strong enough to rip your flesh away
He said "Earth based magnets." What do you think he was talking about?
An MRI involves very powerful magnets (2 Tesla, more than 100,000x the Earth's field) and when I had mine it was on Earth.
Did you see the question mark in my post?
he didn't mean gravity was a weak force
originally posted by: xBWOMPx
Maybe Cern has something to do with it, it's magnetic field is 100,000 times that of earths magnetic field...