magnetic reversal

A change in the Earth's magnetic field resulting in the magnetic north being aligned with the
geographic south, and the magnetic south being aligned with the geographic north. Also called
geomagnetic reversal

When magma rises to the Earth's surface at a mid-ocean ridge, it flows out onto both sides of
the ridge, gradually cooled by the seawater. Like tiny compass needles, the magnetic minerals
in the hot magma are at first free to align themselves with the Earth's magnetic field when the
magma settles into the tectonic plate, but once the lava cools below the Curie point, their
orientation becomes fixed. When readings of the strength of the magnetic field are taken along
sections of the ocean floor near such ridges, segments where it is anomalously high alternate
with segments where it is anomalously low. Anomalously high readings occur because the
magnetometer is picking up both the reading from today's magnetic field and that from the
minerals in the rock that are aligned with it, adding to the total strength of the field, while
anomalously low readings occur when the magnetic minerals are aligned against the Earth's
magnetic field, diminishing the total strength. The rocks that yield these anomalously low
readings therefore must have formed at a time when the Earth's magnetic field was reversed-
oriented in such a way that the north magnetic pole was roughly where today's south magnetic
pole is, and vice versa. These magnetic reversals, in which the direction of the field is flipped,
are believed to occur when small, complex fluctuations of magnetic fields in the Earth's outer
liquid core interfere with the Earth's main dipolar magnetic field to the point where they
overwhelm it, causing it to reverse. The length of time between magnetic reversals is not always
the same, but is on the order of 200,000 to 1,000,000 years; the last magnetic reversal was
about 750,000 years ago. Because the pattern of positive and negative readings is more or less
symmetrical about the axis of the mid-ocean ridge and remains the same throughout the length
of the ridge, geophysicists have been able to construct a calendar of the Earth's magnetic
record dating back to as far as 150-200 million years ago. It is not known when the next
magnetic reversal will be, or how long the process will take, though it will certainly have a
significant impact on the artificial and biological navigational systems of humans and animals.

What causes the periodic reversals of the earth's magnetic field? Have there been any
successful attempts to model the phenomenon?

"The Earth's magnetic field is thought to be generated by fluid motions in the liquid, outer part of
the Earth's core, which is mainly composed of iron. The fluid motions are driven by buoyancy
forces that develop at the base of the outer core as the Earth slowly cools and iron condenses
onto the solid, inner solid core below. The rotation of the Earth causes the buoyant fluid to rise
in curved trajectories, which generate new magnetic field by twisting and shearing the existing
magnetic field. Over 99 percent of the Earth's magnetic energy remains confined entirely within
the core. We only observe the small portion of the magnetic field that extends to the surface and
beyond, where its basic structure is a dipole--that is, a simple north-south field like that of a
simple bar magnet. There are also smaller, non-dipolar structures in the Earth's field; these
change locally and very slightly on a century timescale.
"The dipole part of the field is usually aligned fairly closely with the Earth's rotation axis; in other
words, the magnetic poles are usually fairly close to the geographic poles, which is why a
compass works. Occasionally, however, the dipole part of the field reverses, causing the
locations of the north and south magnetic poles to switch. This reversal process can be seen in
the paleomagnetic record, locked into rocks of the ocean floor and in some lava flows. The
reversal process is not literally 'periodic' as it is on the sun, whose magnetic field reverses every
11 years. The time between magnetic reversals on the Earth is sometimes as short as 10,000
years and sometimes as long as 25 million years; the time it takes to reverse is only about 5,000
years.

"The first dynamically-consistent, three-dimensional computer simulation of the geodynamo (the

mechanism in the Earth's fluid outer core that generates and maintains the geomagnetic field)
was accomplished and published by Paul H. Roberts of the University of California at Los
Angeles and myself in 1995. We programmed supercomputers to solve the large set of
nonlinear equations that describe the physics of the fluid motions and magnetic field generation
in the Earth's core. The simulated geomagnetic field, which now spans the equivalent of over
300,000 years, has an intensity, a dipole-dominated structure and a westward drift at the
surface that are all similar to the Earth's real field. Our model predicted that the solid inner core,
being magnetically coupled to the eastward fluid flow above it, should rotate slightly faster than
the surface of the Earth. This prediction was recently supported by studies of seismic waves
passing through the core.

"In addition, the computer model has produced three spontaneous reversals of the geomagnetic
field during the 300,000-year simulation. So now, for the first time, we have three-dimensional,
time-dependent simulated information about how magnetic reversals can occur. The process is
not simple, even in our computer model. Fluid motions try to reverse the field on a few
thousand-year timescale, but the solid, inner core tries to prevent reversals because the field
cannot change (diffuse) within the inner core nearly as quickly as in the fluid, outer core. Only
on rare occasions do the thermodynamics, the fluid motions and the magnetic field all evolve in
a compatible manner that allows for the original field to diffuse completely out of the inner core
so the new dipole polarity can diffuse in and establish a reversed magnetic field. The stochastic
(random) nature of the process probably explains why the time between reversals on the Earth
varies so much."

SEAFLOOR SPREDING – MAGNETIC REVERSAL

Seafloor spreading is a process that occurs at mid-ocean ridges. These ridges mark the
boundaries between two plates that are diverging, or moving away from one another. As the
plates move apart, the crust is stressed and weakened. This allows magma from under the
surface to break up through the crust, coming out and creating new sea floor. The plates move
apart, carrying the “new” sea floor with it. The idea that this happens was proposed in the
1960s.

At first, seafloor spreading was not proven. However, magnetic reversals have now proven it.
Magnetic reversals occur every so often. When they happen, the Earth’s magnetic field reverses
its polarity. In other words, north becomes south and south becomes north. Magnetic reversal
proves seafloor spreading because we can see the polarity of the Earth’s magnetic field in
rocks. As magma cools, particles in it get “frozen” in the direction of the magnetic field. By
looking at these particles, scientists can see the polarity of the magnetic field at the time the
rocks were created.

If seafloor spreading actually happens, we would expect rocks farthest away from the mid-
ocean ridge to be the oldest and we would expect the rocks to get progressively younger as we
approach the ridge. Magnetic reversals help to prove this because scientists know when the
reversals happened. As you can see in the link below, scientists have found bands of rock with
different polarity on either side of mid-ocean ridges. This proves that these bands of rock were
laid down at different times. The magnetic evidence shows that the oldest rocks are far away
from the ridge and the newest rocks are closest. This is powerful evidence that seafloor
spreading does in fact occur.

A geomagnetic reversal is a change in a planet's magnetic field such that the positions
of magnetic north and magnetic southare interchanged (not to be confused with geographic
north and geographic south). The Earth's field has alternated between periods
of normal polarity, in which the predominant direction of the field was the same as the present
direction, and reversepolarity, in which it was the opposite. These periods are called chrons.
Reversal occurrences are statistically random. There have been 183 reversals over the last 83
million years. The latest, the Brunhes–Matuyama reversal, occurred 780,000 years ago, and
has been argued to have happened very quickly, within a human lifetime. Other sources
estimate that the time that it takes for a reversal to complete is on average around 7000 years
for the four most recent reversals.] Clement (2004)] suggests that this duration is dependent on
latitude, with shorter durations at low latitudes, and longer durations at mid and high latitudes.
Although variable, the duration of a full reversal is typically between 2000 and 12000 years,
which is one to two orders of magnitude less than the duration of magnetic chrons.
Although there have been periods in which the field reversed globally (such as the Laschamp
excursion) for several hundred years, these events are classified as excursions rather than full
geomagnetic reversals. Stable polarity chrons often show large, rapid directional excursions,
which occur more often than reversals, and could be seen as failed reversals. During such an
excursion, the field reverses in the liquid outer core, but not in the solid inner core. Diffusion in
the liquid outer core is on timescales of 500 years or less, while that of the solid inner core is
much longer, around 3000 years.