Since the last century, human technology has been "cheating", making crazy progress along the way. Under this situation, our goals have become more and more "ambitious".
Technology has enabled mankind to realize the dream of "going to heaven and entering the earth"
Simply speaking, Since then, the theme of human exploration of nature has revolved around the three aspects of "going to heaven, entering the earth, and going to the sea".. What we are going to talk about today is "entering the earth" sandwiched between the sky and the sea.
So, going 10,000 meters underground, what did humans find deep in the earth? Is there really a beautiful underground world described in various science fiction novels? Or is there actually prehistoric civilization hidden underground? Next, let us take a look!
Concept map of the "underground world"
The terminated "Kola Borehole"
When it comes to "going into the ground", the Soviet Union must be on the list. After all, during the period when the United States and the Soviet Union competed for hegemony in the last century, the two countries not only launched a series of competitions in the space field, and even 's "earth drilling" was an important competitive project.
Especially after the United States took the lead in sending astronauts to the moon, the Soviet Union, knowing that it could not regain its place in the space field, started its own "drilling through the earth plan". They were in not far from Murmansk Started its own drilling program on the Kola Peninsula .
Soviet workers are carrying out drilling work
After this drilling plan was implemented in 1970, progress began to be relatively fast. Although it was often delayed midway, the deepest drill hole named SG-3 was as early as 1989. When it reached 12263m. This depth was not refreshed until 2008, which shows that the Soviet Union still put a lot of effort into it.
People who understand the structure of the earth may say that although this number seems scary on the surface, in fact the outer solid crust is about 33 kilometers, which means that the Soviet drilling hole is not even connected to the crust. Half of them haven't dug into , so it may not be considered "deep underground".
Schematic diagram of the earth's internal structure
Of course, the penetration into the ground mentioned here is actually obtained by comparing it with other human drilling depths. If compared with the deep scale of the earth's internal structure, it is really nothing. However, what made everyone most curious were the rumors about the "Kola Borehole".
It is said that when people drilled 10,000 meters underground, they heard the "roaring sound" coming from the ground. Some people even said that this was actually the "sound of hell". This terrifying recording even told urban legends. circulated on radio stations.
It is said that it drilled into the "Gate of Hell"
Many people believe that the Soviet Union stopped drilling because they discovered something terrible underground. But in fact, putting aside these rumors, we can find that the suspension of drilling by the Soviet Union is related to the domestic coup, lack of funds, technical difficulties, etc. The real reason for stopping drilling should not be "ghosts and monsters" .
So, what were discovered during this drilling process? Have any treasures been unearthed?
The very inconspicuous Soviet Kola super-deep borehole
What is hidden 10,000 meters underground?
It is no exaggeration to say that nowadays people are actually more curious about the underground world than space, because the frequent space journeys of various astronauts have allowed everyone to see what space looks like, but for the exploration of underground , It is indeed too little, and there is not much data image .
Under such circumstances, conjectures about the underground world are endless. So, what is hidden 10,000 meters underground?
Concept map of the underground world
Generally speaking, it is normal to dig tens of meters or even hundreds of meters. After all, according to the speculation of archaeologists, Qin Shihuang ordered his men to dig out nearly 30 meters as early as thousands of years ago. The depth of the underground palace was built there.
So after we start digging, we will not only encounter some ores in the shallow layer, but also dig out some treasures left by the ancients. If you continue to dig deeper, you will be able to dig out some animal fossils from the ancient geological era. Although they are basically incomplete, they can prove to us that the surface of the earth has really experienced several generations of life changes.
Marine paleontological fossils
When the depth reaches about 1,000 meters, everyone can see the famous "rose" in the ore family, is the beautiful uranium ore . This important ore has always been one of the strategic resources and is of great significance to the country's scientific and technological development.
When the depth of excavation reaches about 4000 meters, everyone's favorite thing will appear, it is the golden .
There are hundreds of billions of tons of gold
stored under the earth's surface, and the gold in this location will be of a higher grade and more enriched than the gold buried on the surface. In this case, if the mining can be successfully completed, it will undoubtedly make a fortune.
Of course, in addition to gold mines, there is also the opportunity to encounter "diamond mines". When the Kola borehole drilled to a depth of 9,500 meters, it found a formation that contained both gold and diamonds. The gold content was astonishingly high, with 80 grams of gold per ton.
The Kola borehole drilled soil samples at 9,000 meters
and continued to penetrate to a depth of 10,000 meters. actually encountered various ores. At this point, everyone may feel a little disappointed. After all, it is rumored that there are various monsters or remnants of prehistoric civilization at this depth, but digging for a long time is just "mining".
In fact, the underground world is really not as magical as described in science fiction novels, because the earth is "solid" after all, and due to the very high pressure, many materials have been compressed again and again. In this case it is impossible to free up space.
The interior of the earth is a solid structure
If you still find this difficult to imagine, you can read Liu Cixin's short article " Brings Her Eyes". This short article published in 1999 describes it to us. What humans encounter when they pilot the spaceship to explore the underground. Although it was published quite a long time ago, it is still quite well written.
It is worth mentioning that humans have not stopped "going underground" to explore , and with the help of various technologies, they may achieve better results in the future.
The extremely mysterious underground space
So, now that we know that the underground is nothing more than various ores, why do humans still insist on "entering the ground"?
Why do humans explore underground?
In the eyes of geologists, it is well known that there are ores underground, but they will still persevere in exploring, because at different depths, the values of temperature and pressure will change , and in this Under the influence of changes, the mineral properties of will change .
For example, ferropericlase is one of the main minerals in the lower mantle. It contains iron atoms magnetic moment that will change with depth . If we can find the laws of this change, then another difficult problem about the properties of the earth's mantle will be solved.
Earth's spheres under different properties
And today, as global warming becomes increasingly serious, humans can no longer burn fossil energy as unscrupulously as before unless they want to end civilization early. In this case,
continues to explore underground. is actually to develop and utilize a new energy . This energy is exactly geothermal energy.
Schematic diagram of the origin of geothermal energy
Generally speaking, dry hot rock geothermal resources refer to the geothermal resources contained in rock masses with temperatures above 200 degrees Celsius. This resource can be directly used for power generation, heating, medical treatment, etc. The field itself has the characteristics of huge resource reserves, high power generation efficiency and relatively clean.
It can be seen from this that mankind will not stop exploring underground, even if the journey is full of various challenges. This is because we understand that the road of exploration cannot be smooth sailing, and during this exploration, humans can find many new things, which are related to the formation and evolution of the earth .
Schematic diagram of the formation process of the earth
You must know that although we have always longed to fly out of the earth and live on other planets in the universe, if we do not even understand the "one-third of an acre" under our feet before leaving, what will happen? How about chasing the stars and the sea?
More importantly, there are rich resources underground, and they may be the key to human civilization entering the next era..
The earth still has too many secrets waiting for us to discover
In addition, human underground exploration not only includes "fancy drilling", but also includes the construction of suitable underground laboratories. For example, as early as 1966, American scientist Lye Davis was trying his best to find places to shield cosmic rays in order to verify the existence of dark matter .
What finally caught his eye was an abandoned mine located in the Homestake Gold Mine. This mine was 1,500 meters deep underground.
In order to realize his scientific dream, this scientist has been experimenting here for more than 30 years, finally discovered the existence of solar neutrinos .
Lee Davis, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics
In addition, countries such as the former Soviet Union, France, and Italy have underground laboratories. Of course, my country's first ultra-deep underground laboratory "China Jinpingshan Underground Laboratory" was also officially put into use at the end of 2010.
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