Symposium on Chemistry at High Pressure, Exploring the Interiors of Planets with Laboratory Experiments and Theory

http://portal.acs.org/portal/acs/corg/content?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=PP_A...

Organizers:

Burkhard Militzer (University of California, Berkeley; militzer@berkeley.edu)
Alexander Goncharov (Geophysical Laboratory, Washington DC; goncharov@gl.ciw.edu)

Overview:

High pressure is unique tool to explore “new” chemistry by creating novel substances and altering the properties of existing compounds. This session seeks to combine two themes. First, we invite abstracts that use high pressure as a way to explore the properties of fluids and solids with laboratory experiments or computer simulations. Secondly, we focus on materials in the interiors of terrestrial and giant planets. This includes silicates, oxides, and metals in terrestrial planets and in the cores of giant planets, and ,furthermore, fluid mixtures of simple molecular compounds: H2, He, CH4, H2O, and NH3 in the mantle of different giant planets. These materials are subjected to high pressures up to 5 TPa and are often hot (up to 20,000 K). Most of previous laboratory studies investigated the behavior of individual components, but the properties of the mixed fluids including chemical reactions and ionization remain to be poorly understood. This information is crucial for constraining the models of planetary interiors. We invite contributions from static and dynamic high pressure communities, theory and computer simulations, and planetologists.