Exhibits
Model of an ultrahigh pressure generator (diamond-anvil cell)
Layered structure inside the Earth
The Earth’s interior is a world under high pressure and at high temperature. We can hardly obtain natural materials from depths greater than about 200 km. Instead, we have been trying to recreate a comparably high-pressure and high-temperature environment in the laboratory to understand the properties of the metals and minerals that make up the Earth’s interior. There are several kinds of devices that generate high pressure. The diamond-anvil cell exhibited here is a device that pressurizes the experimental sample between two flat-tipped, Mt. Fuji-shaped diamonds, the hardest known material. Irradiating the sample with a laser through the diamonds produces more than 400 gigapascals and 5000 kelvins, conditions even more extreme than those in the Earth’s center. Through such methods, every type of material present inside the Earth can be synthesized in the laboratory. The origin of the layered structure inside the Earth has been revealed based on these experiments. Research exploring the interiors of planets other than the Earth is now widespread as well.
Responsibility for wording of the article
Kei Hirose, Professor, Earth and Planetary Physics/Earth and Planetary Environmental Science [2024]