Aquasphere

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The river water in the Skagit River , together with the droplets of mist floating over it, belongs to the terrestrial aquasphere. Because both consist of liquid water.

The aquasphere refers to one of the earth spheres . The term is used with two different meanings. In the first meaning of the term, aquasphere is an alternative name for the hydrosphere . Here the aquasphere designates the entirety of the water on earth in all its aggregate states . This aquasphere term for total water is only used very rarely.

In the second meaning of the term, the aquasphere refers exclusively to that part of the hydrosphere that consists of liquid water: On planet Earth , the aquasphere only includes the occurrence of liquid water. Neither water ice nor invisible water vapor are included. This aquasphere term for liquid water is used more often and especially in planetary research.

History of the term

Aquasphere was one of four Earth-Sphere terms coined in 1938 by teachers at the Zanesville, Ohio public school . At that time, the teachers developed the world's first curriculum for teaching soil protection measures . They had been instructed to do this by WD Ellison. Ellison was Ohio State Project Leader for the recently founded Soil Conservation Service (now Natural Resources Conservation Service ), and the Soil Conservation Service ran a research station in Zanesville. Accordingly, the term aquasphere was originally conceived in order to be able to aptly explain certain soil science issues.

Content and scope

Structure of the subaeric part of the aquasphere.

Spatially, the earth's aquasphere - the entirety of earthly liquid water - begins in the earth's atmosphere. There, tiny droplets form water clouds and water vapor .

The subaeric part of the aquasphere is distributed on the earth's surface . The liquid waters of the seas as well as the liquid waters of flowing waters and still waters of the mainland ( inland waters ) belong to this. Supraglacial meltwater on glacier surfaces can also be added.

The subterranean part of the aquasphere follows below the surface of the earth . It includes the liquid parts of the groundwater down to the deep aquifers . In glaciers, intraglacial melt waters exist within crevasses. Subglacial meltwater occurs under glaciers at the bottom of the glacier. Subglacial lakes may also be found there.

Aquaspheres in the universe

Jupiter's moon Europa with water vapor fountains over its south pole region. The water likely leaked out of the subglacial aquasphere in December 2012.

Outside the earth, liquid water has only been used directly once (as of 2013). This took the form of a single droplet of salty mud on Mars .

Aquaspheres in the form of subglacial extraterrestrial oceans continue to be suspected with great probability under the frozen surfaces of the ice moons Europa ( Jupiter ) and Enceladus ( Saturn ). According to recent evidence, some other moons in the outer solar system could also have an aquasphere, such as Ganymede (Jupiter), Titan (Saturn) or Oberon ( Uranus ).

Outside the solar system, a subglacial aquasphere is suspected in the exoplanet OGLE-2005-BLG-390L b . At Gliese 1214 b , water vapor could be detected in the atmosphere, it is therefore assumed that it could be a so-called ocean planet .

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ^ I. Ritsema: Time in relation to geoscientific data. In: L. Hered (Ed.): Time in GIS: issues in spatio-temporal modeling . Delft 2000, p. 58.
  2. ^ T. Nagumo, R. Hatano: Regional Characteristics of Stream Water Quality during the Snow-Melting Season in Hokkaido. In: Japanese Journal of Soil Science and Plant Nutrition. 72, 2001, p. 41.
  3. ^ A. Assisi: Radioactive Pollution Produced by a Nuclear Attack In Herbal Sources. In: Journal of Military medicine. 5, 2003, p. 47.
  4. ↑ WR Pelier: Models Of Glacial Isostasy And Relative Sea Level. In: AW Bally, PL Bender, TR McGetchin, RI Walcott (Eds.): Dynamics of Plate Interiors . Washington 1980, p. 111.
  5. ↑ P. Birch: Terraforming Venus Quickly. In: Journal of the British Interplanetary Society. 44, 1980, p. 161.
  6. ^ AD Fortes, IG Wood, JP Brodholt, L. Vocadlo: The structure, ordering and equation of state of ammonia dihydrate. In: Icarus. 162, 2003, p. 59.
  7. ^ WB McKinnon: On convection in ice I shells of outer Solar System bodies, with detailed application to Callisto. In: Icarus. 183, 2006, p. 435.
  8. ^ AC Barr, WB McKinnon: Convection in Enceladus' ice shell: Conditions for initiation. In: Geophysical Research Letters. 34, 2007, p. 2.
  9. ^ They Coin Some New Words. In: The Ohio conservation bulletin. 2, 1938, p. 229.
  10. ^ Zanesville Signal. (Zanesville newspaper) January 22, 1939, p. 9.
  11. ↑ LJ Briggs: Current Hydraulic Laboratory Research In The United States · Bulletin X . Washington 1942, p. 19.
  12. ^ JT Harlow: History of Soil Conservation Service National Resource Inventories . Fort Worth 1994, p. 2.
  13. ^ KG Renard: Rainfall Simulators and USDA Erosion Research: History, Perspective and Future. In: LJ Lane (Ed.): Proceedings of the Rainfall Simulator Workshop . Tucson 1985, p. 3.
  14. ↑ NO Rennó, BJ Bos, D. Catling, BC Clark, L. Drube, D. Fisher, W. Goetz, SF Hviid, HU Keller, JF Kok, SP Kounaves, K. Leer, M. Lemmon, MB Madsen, WJ Markiewicz, J. Marshall, C. McKay, M. Mehta, M. Smith, MP Zorzano, PH Smith, C. Stoker, SMM Young: Possible physical and thermodynamical evidence for liquid water at the Phoenix landing site. In: Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets. 114, 2009, p. E00E03
  15. ↑ KM Soderlund, BE Schmidt, J. Wicht, DD Blankenship: Ocean-driven heating of Europa's icy shell at low latitudes. In: Nature Geoscience. 7, 2014, p. 16.
  16. ↑ C. Porco: Enceladus - enigmatic Saturn moon. In: Spectrum of Science. 6, 2009, pp. 24-33.
  17. ↑ AP Showmana, I. Mosqueira, JW Head: On the resurfacing of Ganymede by liquid-water volcanism. In: Icarus . 172, 2004, p. 625.
  18. ↑ L. Iess, RA Jacobson, M. Ducci, DJ Stevenson, JI Lunine, JW Armstrong, SW Asmar, P. Racioppa, NJ Rappaport, P. Tortora: The Tides of Titan. In: Science . 337, 2012, p. 457.
  19. ↑ Hauke ​​Hussmanna, Frank Sohlb, Tilman Spohnb: Subsurface oceans and deep interiors of medium-sized outer planet satellites and large trans-neptunian objects. In: ScienceDirect. November 1, 2006, accessed September 29, 2014 . doi: 10.1016 / j.icarus.2006.06.005
  20. ↑ D. Ehrenreich, A. Lecavelier des Etangs, J.-P. Beaulieu, O. Grasset: On the Possible Properties of Small and Cold Extrasolar Planets: Is OGLE 2005-BLG-390Lb Entirely Frozen? In: The Astrophysical Journal . 651, 2006, p. 535.
  21. ^ Clouds in the atmosphere of the super-Earth exoplanet GJ 1214b. nature.com, January 1, 2014, accessed September 29, 2014 . doi: 10.1038 / nature12888