Dr. Mona L. Delitsky and Dr. Kevin H.Baines discovers that it rains Diamonds on Saturn and Jupiter

Dr. Mona L. Delitsky of California Specialty Engineering in Pasadena, California, and Dr. Kevin H. Baines of the University of Wisconsin-Madison claim that Diamonds may lie within the Hydrogen/Helium Oceans of Saturn and Jupiter!

Even better, they may even be ejected by the planets' cores in volcanic eruptions as liquid Diamonds and ejected into the upper atmosphere to fall as liquid Rain of Diamonds as stated in the article “Saturn's blings: Diamonds may float in the planet's atmosphere”, published October 18, 2013 4:10 PM PDT by Eric Mack, CNET News.

In fact, some of the Diamonds within Jupiter and Saturn core may be so large that they may be gigantic “Diamond-bergs” Floating around inside of the Hydrogen/Helium core of these planets! Imagine that!

It’s already know what conditions are needed for Diamonds to form and to even make them artificially. Here on Earth, Diamonds and even Sapphires as explained in my blog article entitled “Sapphire Screens for smartphones by Q1 2014 - Unscratchable Sign of Virgo is the Man of Steel to revive Jamaican Alumina Industry” can be made from known material under considerable pressure and temperature. It’s also been known for some 30 years that Uranus and Neptune may have Diamond Cores and not cores made of Iron as Earth would have.

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But it’s the applications that are exciting. It suggests that Rare Earth Metals aren’t the only thing we can mine and it’s not just the Moon alone that  they can be mined from as argued in my blog article entitled “Obama and Dr. Pell's Moon Express - Fly Me To the Moon, I''ll Drink To That”. We can also mine Diamonds too as I’d long predicted in my blog article entitled “DARPA HTV-2 and 100-Year Interstellar Travel Research – Diamonds are Forever in the Stars”.

Dr. Mona L. Delitsky and Dr. Kevin H. Baines – Diamonds Rain under Presssure and Temperature

That’s the premise behind their paper that they presented to the prestigious members of the American Astronomical Society's Division for Planetary Sciences in Denver in early ctober 2013 and then later published in the Journal Nature in the article “Diamond drizzle forecast for Saturn and Jupiter”, published 09 October 2013 Maggie McKee, Nature Magazine.

Their conclusion was based on new data about the phase diagram of Carbon using shockwave techniques, the work of Knudson et al. 2008 and Eggert et al. 2010 coming from Sandia Laboratories and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and newly published adiabats (pressure-temperature diagrams) about Jupiter and Saturn carbon based on the work of Nettelmann et al. (2008, 2011).

Dr. Mona L. Delitsky and Dr. Kevin H. Baines have thus predicted that Diamonds must lurk not only inside of the liquid Hydrogen/Helium cores of these planets, but it may be literally Diamonds in the Sky, Rihanna Style as stated in the article “Diamonds in the sky: Scientists find Jupiter and Saturn are awash in Diamonds”, published October 09, 2013, Phys.org.

Diamonds in the Sky – It’s Raining Diamonds

According to the pair, this is how it happens. Lightning in the upper atmosphere combusts atmospheric Methane (CH_4(g)) which would normally turns to Carbon Dioxide (CO₂) and Water (H₂O_(l)). But thanks to the lack of Oxygen, mostly bound up as ozone in the upper atmosphere and the energy levels involved in lightning, the Methane (CH_4(g)) splits in Hydrogen (H_2(g)) and Carbon (C_(g))!

That Carbon later clumps together and forms soot as shown in the Stoichiometric Equations Below:

CH_4(g) ® C_(g) + 2H_2(g)

 2C_(g) ® 2C_(s)

This Carbon (C_(s)) soot then falls to the surface, mostly seas of liquid Methane (CH_4(l)) on both of the Gas Giants, where it aggregates, clumps further and sinks deep into the oceans. As it sinks, it eventually reaches the equivalent of the Earth mantle. But instead of being solid, it’s made of super-cooled liquid/solid Metallic Hydrogen (H_2(s)) and Helium (He_(s)).

At that depth the pressure is extreme. Combined with the low temperature, the Carbon (C_(s)) soot fuses, much as it would do in a Pressure Chamber on Earth, forming first Graphite (C_(s)) and then as it approaches the center of the planets, Diamonds (C_(s)). But closes to the core, it’s mostly solid Hydrogen (H_2(s)).

At that depth, it’s Metallic Hydrogen, with pressures much higher than on earth. This Crushes the Diamonds (C_(s)) and the heat of the Core causes the crushed Diamonds (C_(s)) to rise via Vents to the surface, where Volcanoes made up of Frozen Methane (CH_4(s)) /Helium (He_(s)) spew the Diamonds (C_(s)) in a Pyroclastic flow of super hot Methane (CH_4(s)), Hydrogen (H_2(g)) and Helium (He_(g)) million of miles into the atmosphere, as the gravity on Saturn and Jupiter is weak due to them being Gas Giants.

This crushed Diamonds (C_(s)) falls back to the Surface as Diamonds (C_(s)) Rain. Some may even reach far up into the upper atmosphere of Saturn and end up being swept up by the Gravity of its outer moons, forming rings of not only solid Water (H₂O_(l)) but also Crushed Diamonds (C_(s))!

Diamond Mining is Possible – A Ticket to Jupiter Please 

Dr. Mona L. Delitsky and Dr. Kevin H. Baines appear to be of the imaginative sort. Possibly too, they may be authors in their own right, as they publish many papers on their work to get the University Students they teach interested in Astronomy. So the pair lost no time in publishing their work along with a Work of Fiction that illustrated the idea of Diamond Mining in the year 2469.

The book, Alien Seas, (Springer 2013) on Amazon with illustrations by space artist Michael Carroll, feature a chapter written by Dr. Mona L. Delitsky and Dr. Kevin H. Baines entitled “The Seas of Saturn” in which they describe Diamond Mining activities on Saturn using Robots.

They even predict that in that distant future, Diamonds are used in situ to build the hulls of starships instead of being sold to Earth, as they’d disrupt the Diamond Markets on the planet, albeit in reality the prices are already artificially high thanks to the De Beers Cartel. But it also helps to show that when Rihanna sang the song “Diamonds in the Sky” she may have been predicting the Future in the 25^th Century where this would be commonplace

All of this make Astronomy come alive. Great to see that these scientists were forward thinking enough to even write a work of fiction to bring their paper to life, a rare talent among PhD used to peer reviews for work that no one ever reads unless given as an assignment. Here’s the link to their Paper and the Book that’s a decent read!

Alien Seas, (Springer 2013) on Amazon