An alien planet could be "hidden inside the centre of the Earth", a shock study claims.
Experts think that a rogue planet called Theia which may have collided with the Earth could have left bits of itself within our planet's interior.
Some scientists think the same impact in space formed the Moon but now they have studied the specific traces of the clash that remain buried deep in the Earth's mantle.
Qian Yuan, a geology expert at Arizona State University in the US, think the mysterious dense spots in our planet's interior are specific pieces of Theia that are still intact inside Earth.
In a paper presented at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, Yuan and his team explain: "Here, we demonstrate that Theia's mantle may be several % intrinsically denser than Earth's mantle, which enables the Theia mantle materials to sink to the Earth's lowermost mantle and accumulate into thermochemical piles that may cause the seismically-observed (dense areas)."
Yuan later said: "This crazy idea is at least possible."
The scientists identified specific parts of Earth's interior where pieces of Theia could still be lodged.
This theory that Theia collided with Earth is known as the giant impact hypothesis.
It says that Theia collided with the early Earth around 4.5 billion years ago. Scientists who adhere to the theory say explains the presence of the Moon and why our planet's core is larger than would be expected for a body of its size.
Scientists believe the dense Theia materials could have stayed intact for billions of years as a function of the way Earth's mantle works.
These materials are so dense that they sank and never floated back into the convection zone.
The "continent-sized" areas are the largest portions of Earth’s interior, and it is thought understanding how they formed and how they persist could help push Earth science forward.
Two huge portions are located under West Africa and the Pacific Ocean and are hundreds of miles thick.
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