High-Powered Lasers Melt Mineral for Planet Formation Experiments (IMAGE)

Hiroshima University

High-Powered Lasers Melt Mineral for Planet Formation Experiments

Caption

Researchers observed the melting of forsterite, the most common constituent of Earth's mantle, to understand how the cores of planets form and develop. The laser is able to create pressures representative of the extreme collisions between objects in space. The target is a 4 millimeter square. Al is aluminum and Qz is quartz.

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Image by Toshimori Sekine, Hiroshima University.

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