When we look out the window. The sky was tar-black and the large clouds were moving towards us. A tapping sound on the window and then it became a pitter-patter. People ran for cover outside and umbrellas were opened as the clouds spat out their beads of water. Puddles began plinking as the rainfall became heavier. But what if the tiny droplets are made of diamonds? Yeah you heard me right! it rains diamonds in Neptune. Now it’s time to start exploring and learning more about intriguing diamond worlds of the Solar system.
Theoretical modelling and others predicted that diamonds would form at pressures over 300GPas, but even at lower pressures methane would be disrupted and form chains of hydrocarbons. High pressure experiments at the University of California Berkeley using a diamond anvil cell found that only at 50GPa and a temperature of 2500k, equivalent to depths of 7000kms below Neptune cloud tops. Water and hydrogen mixed with the methane may alter the chemical reactions. A physicist at the Fritz Haber Institute in Berlin showed that the carbon on these planets is not concentrated enough to form diamonds from scratch. Diamond is denser than the methane, ammonia and water left in the ice layer, the carbon crystals would start to sink toward the planet’s core. It would accumulate into new layers as it falls when it touches other isolated carbon atoms or diamonds. This allows individual diamond blocks to reach a size of meters in diameter. As a result, a thick layer of carbon surrounds the rocky cores of Neptune. This layer consists of solid diamond blocks, or if temperature increases it either consists of liquid carbon or a mix of solid and liquid carbon. If it’s so, the solid carbon would be of lower density than liquid carbon, resulting in large “diamond bergs” floating on the top of liquid carbon.
Neptune is emitting more energy than it receives from the Sun. This is because diamond precipitation releases gravitational energy, which is converted into heat by friction between the diamonds and surrounding materials. This internal energy source accounts for the origin of violent storms on the planet's surface. Diamond formation also explains the exotic magnetic fields on Neptune. These ice giant fields originate in a thin variable layer of conducting materials such as metallic hydrogen (a by-product of making diamond), unlike Earth’s magnetic field that extends from pole to pole. Other exotic processes such as super-ionic structure of water and ammonia also contribute to the magnetic fields.
But planet earth's atmosphere is not of the type of Neptune. What will you do if the earth rains diamond? Make sure you mention in the comment section...
- Divya
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