Around 4.5 billion years ago a giant object around the size of Mars crashed into the proto-planet Earth, called Theia. This essentially redid the planet and created the Moon, but new research suggests it also changed the way Earth would behave for the rest of its days.
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00:00 [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:04 Our planet's crust is made up of multiple giant slabs of Earth
00:07 called tectonic plates.
00:09 And while one might conclude that all rocky worlds probably
00:11 have a similar tectonic assembly, they don't.
00:14 And researchers might finally know
00:15 why our planet seems to have this relatively rare structure.
00:19 Around 4.5 billion years ago, a giant object
00:21 called Theia, which was around the size of Mars,
00:23 crashed into the protoplanet Earth.
00:26 This essentially redid the planet and created the moon.
00:28 But new research suggests it also
00:30 changed the way Earth would behave
00:32 for the rest of its days.
00:33 The new study outlines how the impact increased temperatures
00:36 at the core mantle boundary, kicking off
00:38 plate tectonic movement.
00:40 With the researchers writing, quote,
00:42 "In this study, we perform whole mantle convection models
00:44 to illustrate that strong mantle plumes can arise,
00:47 weaken the lithosphere, and eventually initiate
00:50 subduction about 200 million years after the giant impact."
00:53 Subduction is where one tectonic plate goes under another
00:56 and is driven into the Earth's mantle.
00:58 The plumes that are mentioned still occur today.
01:00 And they arise from blobs of material
01:02 that have increased temperatures over the rest of the mantle.
01:04 The researchers add this is also due to the type of material
01:07 that make up these hot blobs, which they say are iron rich
01:11 and most likely contain material from Theia.
01:14 (upbeat music)
01:17 (upbeat music)