A miniature planet synthesised at Oxford’s petrology labs. It may not look like a planet, but it has undergone the same processes that our own Earth did during its formation. Under incredibly high temperatures and pressures, you can see that the siderophile, ‘metal-loving’ elements like iron (the shiny silvery bit at the centre) have migrated to the core, while the lithophile, ‘rock-loving’ elements like silica (the black bit) have migrated to the outer edge to form a crude kind of mantle. Obviously the timescale for creating this was not the same as for the Earth but the process was essentially the same.

A miniature planet synthesised at Oxford’s petrology labs. It may not look like a planet, but it has undergone the same processes that our own Earth did during its formation. Under incredibly high temperatures and pressures, you can see that the siderophile, ‘metal-loving’ elements like iron (the shiny silvery bit at the centre) have migrated to the core, while the lithophile, ‘rock-loving’ elements like silica (the black bit) have migrated to the outer edge to form a crude kind of mantle.
Obviously the timescale for creating this was not the same as for the Earth but the process was essentially the same.