SCI/TECH: When North Becomes South: New Clues to Earth's Magnetic Flip

The Earth's magnetic field takes an average of only 7000 years to reverse its polarity, but the switch happens much more quickly near the equator, according to the most comprehensive study yet of the last four reversals. A new study pins down how long it took for the last four reversals to play out. It also finds that the dramatic turnarounds occur more quickly nearer the equator than at higher latitudes closer to the poles.

Space.com

That means folks living during the next reversal -- which some scientists speculate might be underway -- will see compasses change and behave differently in different locations, study leader Brad Clement, of Florida International University, told SPACE.com.

"It's important to get an idea of how fast or slow this process is because it ends up controlling our idea of how the field is generated in the first place," says study author Bradford Clement, an earth scientist at Florida International University in Miami, US.

Previous studies have reported a bewildering range of transition times, from a few thousand to nearly 30,000 years. So Clement scoured the published data on the most recent reversals to set the record straight.

He used data from 30 cores drilled from the beds of lakes or seas, whose minerals clearly recorded the magnetic field as sediments in the water slowly solidified into rock. The cores were taken from latitudes ranging from 46 degrees south to 60 degrees north and from a wide range of longitudes.

Clement found that the duration of the transitions varied with latitude, from 2000 years near the equator to 11,000 years nearer the poles. This result concurs with a much smaller study he conducted 20 years ago using just 10 cores.

Related articles on the web

New Scientist.com
University of Pittsburgh: When North Goes South
First Science.com
British Geological Survey: Magnetic Reversals



[Edited on 9-4-2004 by Zion Mainframe]

[Edited on 4-9-2004 by Valhall]

i think the most important part of this study is where scientists say that it seems that a reversal is on its way.

That during the last 2,000 years the magnetic field has been dropping dramatically and it normally takes from 1,000 to 28,000 years for a reversal to occur. It is also worthy to note that they say in the article that the process is not fully understood, and that the Earth mantle plays an important role as one study shows.

They don't know exactly when it will happen, it could be soon, or it could be in 26,000 years.

That means that the neat coffee cup I got from New Zealand with the globe pictured upside down wont be funny anymore in thousands of years.

Drat.

Originally posted by Outland
That means that the neat coffee cup I got from New Zealand with the globe pictured upside down wont be funny anymore in thousands of years.

Drat.

No, let me clear up something here:

The only thing that changes is the magnetic field of the earth. It's not like all the continents change place.

When I first read this, my thought was that if the magnetic field reverses, what about electricity ? Would it still be the normal AC/DC or would that also reverse.

Hopefully any physicists out there can prove that I'm spouting # - otherwise all of our electrical equipment will need updating.

AC and DC will not be affected. However, your eyes may cross.

You're going to have to learn to read your compass backwards...

or move to Australia.

The coincidence of this is that the Ancients tracked precession to 27,000 years from the start of the furth sun or fifth yuga and the corrected modern scientific correlation is 25,766 years. Do you suppose that they were so concerned with precession (the cycle of the earth's travel through the 12 houses of the zodiac) because they could use the star time but didn't have the technology to track the pole shift?

Here's something really neat, when the poles reverse, the ozone layer loses is potency due to lack of a "draw" concentration. Ozone layer lets more UV light in, UV light affects the DNA coding of life on earth, thus causing mutations.

Here's the cool part, the last time the poles shifted, the first humans appeared. Chew on that

Do you have anything to back up that claim about ozone and mutations?

UV is a radiation correct?
How radiation affects cells
Mutation, Mutagens, and DNA Repair
FORMATION OF MUTATIONS AND NEW ALLELES

4. What types of mutational DNA damage can radiation cause?

Damage to DNA is caused by photons of ultraviolet light, X rays, and gamma rays, but not by photons of lower energy (visible light, microwaves, radio waves).

The highest energy photons (X rays and gamma rays) cause the breakage of covalent bonds, leading to a variety of damaging effects on DNA.

Photons of ultraviolet light get absorbed by DNA, causing a rearrangement of covalent bonds to give the production of "pyrimidine dimers" (usually involving two thymines), as shown in Figure 7.20.

DNA damage caused by UV light, X rays, or gamma rays may kill a cell unless the damage is repaired before or during the next round of DNA replication. The mutagenic effects of these forms of radiation are primarily due to errors that occur during the repair process; i.e., the repair job is good enough to keep the cell alive but may not return the DNA to exactly the same state.

Cancer is a mutation and is expressed in our DNA coding?
Genetics and cancer risk

Ultraviolet (UV) light can cause different types of DNA damage...

seekerof

Originally posted by Dreamstone
Here's something really neat, when the poles reverse, the ozone layer loses is potency due to lack of a "draw" concentration. Ozone layer lets more UV light in, UV light affects the DNA coding of life on earth, thus causing mutations.

Here's the cool part, the last time the poles shifted, the first humans appeared. Chew on that

I guess i should have been more specific. Where is the source for the claim that the 'ozone layer loses its potency due to lack of a "draw" concentration'? Is the pole shift the reason we have holes in the ozone today?
I have read that havnt i, there are holes in the ozone currently arent there?
Secondly, where can i read about the last pole shift coinciding with the appearence of humans?

Cannot answer all your questions, though they be directed to Dreamstone, but perhaps this link will help in that it may provide a wealth of links pertaining to Pole Shifts, theory, evidences of, propehecy dealing with Pole Shifts, and ancient history relating to possible Pole Shift experiences.
Pole Shift Links



seekerof

So what happens to us once the Earths magnetic poles start shifting....?

First they weaken, then we are without any (or hardly anything for a few thousand years). Then it starts increasing and poles are now at the opposite sides of the Earth....

So..... What is going to happen when we have no poles?

Massive cancer and genetic mutations around the world?

How will we handle the extra radiation that will be coming towards earth?

Seekerof said:

"Cancer is a mutation and is expressed in our DNA coding?"

Absolutely. This is the main reason why our imune system fails at fighting cancer. The DNA is re-arranged to produce a mutant (sometimes cancerous) cell but is still identified by anti-bodies as being our own, so it's not attacked.

Back to the thread....

While a slow pole shift in itself should not pose any harm aside from navigation, I would be interested to know what the result would be on the Van Allen radiation belts. Earth's magnetosphere is partly responsible for keeping them in check.



[Edited on 22-4-2004 by Outland]

I do believe it's already underway. I work on ships, the NOAA and all marine transportation agencies publish magnetic deviations on charts. They change every year. However it's been noted that a lot of these deviations are a lot more than previously estimated.

I recommend watching the movie "The Core". A little stupid, but the scientific parts of the effects of a destablized magnetic field were interesting.

Maybe the holes in the Ozone aren't a result of "Greenhouse Gases" but of a destabilized magnetic field.

Originally posted by DEEZNUTZ
Maybe the holes in the Ozone aren't a result of "Greenhouse Gases" but of a destabilized magnetic field.

I don't believe that anyone really blamed those mythical "greenhouse gases" for the ozone hole, but chloroflourocarbons (like Freon and related compounds) were. Freon (from leaking air conditioning systems) was being heavily blamed thus mandating it's abolishment. It was said that Freon would break down into chlorine which destroys the ozone.

What was never mentioned is that the largest contributor to free chlorine in the atmosphere is the use of chlorine in municipal water systems and swimming pools. The chlorine escapes into the atmosphere, but never got any blame.

The one thing that never sat right with me over blaming Freon was that chloroflourocarbon molecules are extremely heavy.. heavier than any normal vapor or gas in the atmopshere. In fact, the main health warning for those compounds is a danger of suffocation is low areas since it would diplace other gases. So how the heck did it get into the upper atmosphere to destroy ozone?

Of course, when the ozone hole at the south pole all but closed up unexpectedly a couple years ago, no one had an answer.