An initial map of fine-scale heterogeneity in the Earth’s inner core

• Published in: Nature geoscience Vol. 15; no. 3; pp. 240 - 244
• Main Authors: Wang, Wei, Vidale, John E.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 01.03.2022; Nature Publishing Group
• Subjects: 704/2151/123; 704/2151/210; 704/2151/508; Arrays; Backscattering; Crystals; Downwelling; Dynamics; Earth; Earth and Environmental Science; Earth core; Earth mantle; Earth science; Earth Sciences; Earth System Sciences; Earthquakes; Freezing; Geochemistry; Geographical distribution; Geology; Geophysics/Geodesy; Heterogeneity; Identification; Large aperture seismic array; P-waves; Scattering; Seismic activity; Seismic arrays; Seismic data; Seismological data; Seismology; Surveys
• ISSN: 1752-0894; 1752-0908
• DOI: 10.1038/s41561-022-00903-8

The seismological properties of Earth’s inner core are key to understanding its composition, dynamics and growth history. Within the inner core, fine-scale heterogeneity has previously been identified from backscattering of high-frequency compressional waves. Here we use historical earthquake and explosion data from the Large Aperture Seismic Array, USA, between 1969 and 1975 to build a 3D map of heterogeneity from the inner-core boundary to 500 km depth and determine the geographical distribution of the scatterers across the 40% of the inner core that is visible to the array. Our model has two regions of strong scattering, one beneath eastern Asia and the other beneath South America, both located where past local surveys have identified scattering. We suggest that these loci of strong, fine-scale heterogeneities may be related to random alignments of small, inner-core crystals due to fast freezing. These areas, which have been identified as having high attenuation and lie beneath colder areas of the core–mantle boundary, potentially provide constraints on the dynamics of the inner core and the motions in the outer core, with downwelling in the mantle and outer core possibly associated with strong scattering and inner-core heterogeneity. Two regions of fine-scale heterogeneity in Earth’s inner core may be due to the random alignment of fast-freezing crystals associated with downwelling in the mantle and outer core, according to a 3D map of inner-core seismic data.