We know it's kind of weird in there, and it turns out that hyperactive atoms and "soft" iron may be the cause.
Researchers have been aware for a few years that our inner core may not be the simple, solid ball of metal that we believed it to be. Seismic waves have illuminated that the core doesn't appear to be truly solid after all, and there are a few competing theories as to why. In a new study, a team proposes that the inner core is in fact solid, but that the conditions of its location may cause atoms to become hyperactive and make it kind of squishy. It maybe shouldn't be so surprising that we discover new facts about the core of our planet fairly frequently. It seems like we really should know pretty much everything about Earth by now, but considering that we can't get down there first-hand (and even if we could, it's way too hot and high-pressure), studying our core can be as difficult as studying far-away exoplanets. Anything hard to get at is hard to understand. But we may have a new tidbit of understanding. Recently, a group of scientists published a study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences claiming that our supposedly solid core is actually kind of squishy. But contrary to what you might think at first, it doesn't seem to be a composition thing—it's an atomic thing. Basically, the "solid" stuff our core is made of isn't actually that solid of a solid. Related Story Earth's Inner Core Has Another Inner Core Here's the idea. The inner core of…