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Short-term episodicity of Archaean plate tectonics
- Source :
- Geology, Geology, 2012, 40 (5), pp.451-454. ⟨10.1130/G322894⟩, Geology, Geological Society of America, 2012, 40 (5), pp.451-454. ⟨10.1130/G322894⟩
- Publication Year :
- 2012
- Publisher :
- Geological Society of America, 2012.
-
Abstract
- By combining geochemical data and geodynamical models, evidence is provided to address the existence and style of Archaean plate tectonics, a topic of vigorous debate for decades. Using careful analyses of lithostratigraphic Archaean assemblages and numerical model results, we illustrate that a short-term episodic style of subduction was a viable style of tectonics in the early Earth. Modeling results show how, due to the low strength of slabs in a hotter Earth, frequent slab break-off events prevented a modern-style long-lived subduction system, and resulted in frequent cessation and re-initiation of the subduction process on a typical time scale of a few million years. Results fit with geochemical observations that suggest frequent alternation of arc-style and non-arc-style volcanism on a similarly short time scale. Such tectonics could provide the link between early pre-plate tectonic style of tectonics (or stagnant-lid convection) and modern-style plate tectonics, in which short-term episodes of proto-subduction evolved over time into a longer-term, more successful style of plate tectonics as mantle temperature decayed.
- Subjects :
- 010504 meteorology & atmospheric sciences
Subduction
[SDE.MCG]Environmental Sciences/Global Changes
Archean
Earth science
Geology
010502 geochemistry & geophysics
Early Earth
01 natural sciences
Mantle (geology)
Paleontology
Tectonics
Plate tectonics
[SDU.STU.GC]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Geochemistry
13. Climate action
Erosion and tectonics
Plume tectonics
ComputingMilieux_MISCELLANEOUS
0105 earth and related environmental sciences
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 19432682 and 00917613
- Volume :
- 40
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Geology
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....57cdc9b501f7f6e59ad3c1cf2d14b102