While volcanic eruptions and earthquakes serve as immediate reminders that the Earth's interior is far from tranquil, there are other, more elusive, dynamic processes at work deep beneath our feet. These sorts of mysteries are slowly been addressed by human curiosity and passionate minds!  Scientists identified an entirely new sort of magnetic wave that sweeps across the outermost region of Earth's outer core every seven years using data from ESA's Swarm satellite project. This interesting discovery, announced at the ESA's Living Planet Symposium, provides a new window into a world we will never visit.

Understanding the origin of the magnetic field, why it changes continually, how it interacts with the solar wind, and why it is currently weakening are all issues of interest to scientists. The majority of the magnetic field is generated by Earth's outer core's ocean of superheated, whirling liquid iron. The outer core of the Earth works like a spinning conductor in a bicycle dynamo. It produces electrical currents as well as a constantly changing electromagnetic field.

These magnetic impulses from Earth's core are measured by ESA's Swarm project, which consists of three identical satellites. Other signals from the crust, seas, ionosphere, and magnetosphere are also measured. Scientists have discovered a hidden secret using data from the Swarm mission. They discovered a new form of magnetic wave sweeping across the surface of the Earth's outer core. What's more, this wave oscillates every seven years and travels westward at up to 1500 kilometers each year. Because of the rotation of the Earth, these waves align in columns along the axis of rotation. These waves' velocity and magnetic field fluctuations are most noticeable in the core's equatorial region. Nicolas Gillet, from the University Université Grenoble Alpes and lead author of the paper, said, “Geophysicists have long theorized over the existence of such waves, but they were thought to take place over much longer time scales than our research has shown.”

Other comparable waves, with longer periods, are likely to exist, according to these findings, but their detection will require additional research.