Chondritic osmium isotope composition of early Earth mantle
The Ujaragssuit Intrusion, North Atlantic Craton (NAC), Greenland, is thought to host the oldest chromitites (>3.8 Ga) on Earth, showing evidence of both Hadean mantle depletion events and nucleosynthetic isotopic heterogeneities. We set out to verify the age of the intrusion and identify the Os...
| Published in: | Geochemical Perspectives Letters |
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| Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
| Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2024
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://curis.ku.dk/portal/da/publications/chondritic-osmium-isotope-composition-of-early-earth-mantle(252bc97d-b40c-40aa-bc50-26ee869e287a).html https://doi.org/10.7185/geochemlet.2424 https://curis.ku.dk/ws/files/396992959/Waterton_et_al_2024_Chondritic_Os_isotope_composition_of_early_Earth_mantle.pdf |
| Summary: | The Ujaragssuit Intrusion, North Atlantic Craton (NAC), Greenland, is thought to host the oldest chromitites (>3.8 Ga) on Earth, showing evidence of both Hadean mantle depletion events and nucleosynthetic isotopic heterogeneities. We set out to verify the age of the intrusion and identify the Os isotope composition of the Ujaragssuit mantle source. Here, we show that the only minimum age constraint is 2970 ± 8 Ma, provided by cross-cutting leucogranites. Concordant Re-Pt-Os isotope ages are consistent with formation of the intrusion from a chondritic primitive mantle source at 3246 ± 120 Ma; mean Pt-depletion ages of 3437 ± 587 Ma offer no direct evidence for Hadean mantle depletion. No nucleosynthetic Os isotopic anomalies could be identified, consistent with large scale Os homogeneity in the presolar nebular. The new ‘young’ age for Ujaragssuit means that nucleosynthetic anomalies occur repeatedly between ∼3.8 and >3.0 Ga in the NAC, suggesting its unique mantle source was repeatedly tapped over ∼600 Myr without significant mixing with the rest of Earth’s mantle. |
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