Designed to the Core

Hugh Ross, 2022

p15Ch 1 The Anthropic Principle

p19Ch 2 Exterior Design Features

p31Ch 3 Large-Scale Cosmic Structures

p55Ch 4 The Laniakea Supercluster

p63Ch 5 The Virgo Cluster Interior

p71Ch 6 The Local Group Interior

p85Ch 7 The Milky Way Galaxy Interior

p105Ch 8 The Local Arm

p117Ch 9 Interior Veatures of the Sun

p131Ch 10 Our Planetary System

p149Ch 11 Planetary Migration and Orbital Configuuration

p161Ch 12 Small Solar System Bodies

p165 Delivery of Resources for Life

A discussion of the variety of impactors and the materials they deposit on the Earth.

p166 "About 25 million interplanetary bodies heavier than 0.1 grams enter the Earth's atmosphere every day." Average of 15-70 million kg per year. Most are pieces of broken comets or meteoroids that burn up in the atmosphere. "..life needs what material does make it through." "Earth loses water to interplanetary space as the Sun's ultraviolet rays strike water molecules in the upper atmosphere." current loss rate about 500,000 kg/yr which is considered small. Maybe as high as 10 million kg/yr at some stages of Earth's development. Earth likely received most of its water from enstatite chondrite (EC) comets and meteorites. The rate of delivery of water over the past 3.8 billion years considered just right due to optimum abundance, location and orbital characteristics of the solar system's asteroid-comet belts.

p166 5-10% of nitrogen delivered 4.0-2.5 billion years ago by Kuiper Belt comets.Discusses critical balance of N.

p167 Delivery of Resources for Civilization

Some metallic asteroids composed of iron, nickel, cobalt and trace amounts of heavier elements. Some better stainless steel than our manufactured versions. Large asteroid and comet strikes over past 2 billion years have provided Earth's richest metal ore deposits.

• p167 Ni content (5-26%) makes malleable enough to cold-forge weapons and tools, ~6000BC
• Inuit to Greenland, pieces of Cape York meteorite (>60 tons), part of 1.5km Hiawatha impactor, 12,800 years ago.
• 10-15km impactor 1.849 billion yrs Lake Huron Canada, formed Sudbury Basin, rich in Ni, Co, and platinum group metals. It impacted so forcefully as to bring up Ni and Cu-rich magma from Earth's mantle. Crater 150-260km diameter world's leading source of Ni until 1970s. For decades 95% of world's Ni market. Currently still a third.
• p168 Kaapvaal Craton in South Africa holds world's largest remaining impact crater, the Vredefort Crater. It was >300km across when formed 2.023 billion years ago. Brought up gold and platinum group deposits.Overlapped by the Witwatersrand Basin, it is the largest gold and platinum deposit on Earth. After extraction of 47,000 tons of gold, still contains about half as much as the rest of the world.
• Popigai Crater in northern Siberia had impact of 5-8 km asteroid 33.7 million years ago, transforming graphite to diamonds 0.5-10mm or .001-4 carats. It's the world's largest known diamond deposit.
• From team of geologists: virtually all of Earth's impact craters > 2km diameter have provided economically valuable mineral deposits.

p169 Discusses the three impacts >1km diameter in last 2.58 million years.

• 2,580,000 yrs below southern tip of South America, role in launching ice age cycle.
• 800,000 yrs South China Sea, helped change ice age period from 41000 to ~100000 yrs.
• 12,800 yrs northwest Greenland, credited with beginning the era of extreme climate stability.

p171Ch 13 The Lunar Interior

p183Ch 14 Earth's Core Features

p199Ch 15 Earth's Mantle

p207Ch 16 Earth's Crustal Interior

p221Ch 17 Innterior Design Implications

p225 Appendix: Solar Element Abundance - Rocky Planet Configuration Link