How We Discovered That The Earth’s Inner Core Is Older Than Previously thought

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Dating the Earth’s enigmatic inner core: a Pluto-sized ball of iron that is super hot and frozen at the same time. Kelvinsong/wikimedia, CC BY-SA

According to recent estimates, the Earth’s solid inner core started forming between half a billion and one billion years ago. However, our new measurements of ancient rocks as they cool from magma have indicated that it may actually have started forming more than half a billion years earlier.