: The earth’s inner core is 9,800° F, almost as hot as the sun. Why is the core solid? Shouldn’t the iron and nickel liquify?

Question

I also read that it may be somewhere between solid and liquid in a “superionic” state. But I don’t really understand what they mean. Is there an animated video of this hypothesis?

In: Planetary Science

Answer 1

Substances under pressure can stay a solid at higher temperature. For example, look at this phase diagram for water and see that it is possible for water to stay frozen as ice at 100 degrees C (and higher) if the pressure is very high.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Phase_diagram_of_water_simplified.svg