[meteorite-list] A New Nearby Oddball Planet

From: star-bits at tx.rr.com <star-bits_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Tue, 3 May 2011 2:36:10 -0400
Message-ID: <20110503063610.4DZ90.117.root_at_cdptpa-web27-z01>

Sterling wrote:

<A planet of 75% iron with a 25% crust of Tungsten would have a density of 11, and I suppose that if everything less refractory than tungsten had boiled away, you could get such a planet...>

Those densities are for items sitting on your desk. The iron core of earth has a density of almost 13gm/cm^3 out to 1000km. Over the next 2000km the density drops to around 11gm/cm^3. I would imagine if this planet is 1.6 times the diameter of earth the 11+gm/cm^3 would extend even farther from the center. Additionally if most of the lighter elements have boiled away leaving a mostly iron and refractory element sphere, the 11+gm/cm^3 could comprise a significant portion of the sphere with the center being very dense. In other words it probably doesn't need an exotic mix to get to this density. The core of a gas giant boiled away (as Sterling mentioned) to the iron and refractory elements would probably do just fine.

--
Eric Olson
610 W. Moore Rd
Tucson AZ 85755
http://www.star-bits.com

Received on Tue 03 May 2011 02:36:10 AM PDT