Noble gas insights into early impact delivery and volcanic outgassing to Earth's atmosphere: A limited role for the continental crust

Zhang, Xinmu J.; Avice, Guillaume; Parai, Rita

doi:10.1016/j.epsl.2023.118083

Title: Noble gas insights into early impact delivery and volcanic outgassing to Earth's atmosphere: A limited role for the continental crust

Journal Article · Fri Mar 10 00:00:00 EST 2023 · Earth and Planetary Science Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2023.118083· OSTI ID:1970176

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Washington Univ., St. Louis, MO (United States); Univ. of California, San Diego, CA (United States)
Univ. of Paris (France)
Washington Univ., St. Louis, MO (United States)

Earth's atmosphere, crust and mantle have evolved together through continuous geochemical exchange throughout Earth's history. Constraints on the transport of volatile elements and compounds between these reservoirs are crucial for understanding how Earth could have stayed habitable for extended periods of time. In this work, we present a new forward model of He, Ne and Ar in the mantle, crust and atmosphere. We explore concentrations of noble gases at the end of accretion, bulk silicate Earth K/U ratios, crustal growth scenarios, and upper mantle processing rates throughout Earth's history. We search for parameter combinations that simultaneously satisfy observational constraints on present-day mantle ⁴He/³He and ⁴⁰Ar/³⁶Ar (sensitive to mantle outgassing and continental crust growth, which depletes the mantle of U, Th and K), atmospheric ²⁰Ne/²²Ne (which tracks the mix of outgassed vs. delivered Ne in the atmosphere), and atmospheric ⁴⁰Ar/³⁶Ar in the past and today (sensitive to volatile delivery, mantle outgassing and crustal growth). Leveraging this intertwined set of noble gas abundances and isotopic compositions yields new constraints on initial noble gas abundances in the mantle and on the proportions of atmospheric volatiles originating from delivery by impact degassing, mantle outgassing, and degassing of the continental crust. We find that atmospheric Ar isotopic evolution is primarily sensitive to the mantle processing rate history; the atmospheric Ar isotopic record should therefore not be used to reconstruct continental crust growth, but instead provides valuable insights into mantle processing rates. Our model predicts a measurably low ²⁰Ne/²²Ne ratio of ~9.7 in Archean atmospheric samples. Most of atmospheric primordial ³⁶Ar was directly delivered by chondritic bodies and not transferred to the atmosphere during an intense early episode of mantle outgassing. Nitrogen delivered by impact degassing could account for the present-day atmospheric nitrogen inventory.

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Research Organization:: Washington Univ., St. Louis, MO (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)

Grant/Contract Number:: NA0003911; DENA0003911

OSTI ID:: 1970176

Alternate ID(s):: OSTI ID: 1962256

Journal Information:: Earth and Planetary Science Letters, Vol. 609; ISSN 0012-821X

Publisher:: ElsevierCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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58 GEOSCIENCES
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continental crust
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Title: Noble gas insights into early impact delivery and volcanic outgassing to Earth's atmosphere: A limited role for the continental crust

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