#InSight

A timber drilling derrick on open ground with a long run of rock core in wooden trays on trestles, one fresh core section caught tilted as it slides from the barrel toward an empty slot

How We Know What Is Inside a Planet

No instrument has ever reached a planetary mantle. Interior structure is reconstructed from waves, orbits, tides and magnetic fields, and every reconstruction rests on assumptions the data alone cannot test.

By Brecht Corbeel · August 9, 2026 · 19 min read

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