Earth’s magnetic field is constantly shifting around, and every 200,000 to 300,000 years, it flips north and south completely. Currently, we’re long overdue for a reversal, and scientists suggest that it could very well happen within the next century, potentially altering life in ways that aren’t possible to predict.
For the longest time, the scientific community believed that these reversals took as many as 7,000 years to completely switch, according to a 2004 study funded by the National Science Foundation. Over the last few years, however, many scientists have suggested that the shifts in the magnetic field have occurred at previously unimagined speeds.
A new study which was published in the Geophysical Journal International by a team of scientists from Europe and the United States sheds light on these quick changes, suggesting that the last reversal took a mere 100 years. But how was the team able to discern changes in the magnetic field that occurred hundreds of thousands of years ago?
Apparently, the team was able to do this by testing layers of ash that were deposited by volcanic eruptions that occurred over the course of 10,000 years, found in a small lakebed near Rome. A new release from University of California, Berkeley says that the magnetic field directions are “frozen” into these layers of ash, which could be reliably dated to discover when the magnetic reversals occurred, and how long it took for them to complete.
“It’s amazing how rapidly we see that reversal. The paleomagnetic data are very well done. This is one of the best records we have so far of what happens during a reversal and how quickly these reversals can happen,” said co-author Courtney Sprain of the University of California and Berkeley Geochronology Center.
Read more about the story at Berkeley.
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