Some Diamonds Might Be Planet-Sized
Posted on: Tuesday, 8 February 2005, 21:00 CST
U.S. astronomers said some planets might contain so much carbon that part of their interiors have turned into diamond layers hundreds of miles thick.
Astronomers at Princeton University said such planets would have a composition based on carbon, in contrast with Earth and the other rocky planets of the solar system, which are based mainly on silicon.
Such planets would be created by explosions of carbon-rich stars that also produced low levels of oxygen. In such cases, the resulting planet-forming disks would contain large quantities of compounds such as graphite, which if condensed and heated sufficiently would form diamond structures of planet-sized dimensions.
As evidence, the team has found carbon-rich meteorites imbedded with minute quantities of diamond, which they said suggests the existence of such planets.
They said the best place to look for diamond planets might be near the center of the Milky Way, where a large potential number of carbon-rich stars are located. As time goes by, the Princeton team said, the whole galaxy will become richer in carbon, thereby increasing the odds that new planets will be high-carbon in content and possibly contain massive diamond layers.
Source: United Press International
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