We conducted high‐pressure experiments on hexagonal close packed iron (hcp‐Fe) in MgO, NaCl, and Ne pressure‐transmitting media and found general agreement among the experimental data at 300 K that yield the best fitted values of the bulk modulus K0 = 172.7(±1.4) GPa and its pressure derivative K0′ = 4.79(±0.05) for hcp‐Fe, using the third‐order Birch‐Murnaghan equation of state. Using the derived thermal pressures for hcp‐Fe up to 100 GPa and 1800 K and previous shockwave Hugoniot data, we developed a thermal equation of state of hcp‐Fe. The thermal equation of state of hcp‐Fe is further used to calculate the densities of iron along adiabatic geotherms to define the density deficit of the inner core, which serves as the basis for developing quantitative composition models of the Earth's inner core. We determine the density deficit at the inner core boundary to be 3.6%, assuming an inner core boundary temperature of 6000 K.

A compositional variety of planetary cores provides insight into their core/mantle evolution and chemistry in the early solar system. To infer core composition from geophysical data, a precise knowledge of elastic properties of core‐forming materials is of prime importance. Here, we measure the sound velocity and density of liquid Fe‐Ni‐S (17 and 30 at% S) and Fe‐Ni‐Si (29 and 38 at% Si) at high pressures and report the effects of pressure and composition on these properties. Our data show that the addition of sulfur to iron substantially reduces the sound velocity of the alloy and the bulk modulus in the conditions of this study, while adding silicon to iron increases its sound velocity but has almost no effect on the bulk modulus. Based on the obtained elastic properties combined with geodesy data, S or Si content in the core is estimated to 4.6 wt% S or 10.5 wt% Si for Mercury, 9.8 wt% S or 18.3 wt% Si for the Moon, and 32.4 wt% S or 30.3 wt% Si for Mars. In these core compositions, differences in sound velocity profiles between an Fe‐Ni‐S and Fe‐Ni‐Si core in Mercury are small, whereas for Mars and the Moon, the differences are substantially larger and could be detected by upcoming seismic sounding missions to those bodies.