eEarth www.electronic-earth.net 1815-381X 1815-3828 2 2 2007 10.5194/ee-2-43-2007 http://www.electronic-earth.net/2/43/2007/ http://www.electronic-earth.net/2/43/2007/ee-2-43-2007.html http://www.electronic-earth.net/2/43/2007/ee-2-43-2007.pdf 43 49 2007-10-08 Noble gas signature of the Late Heavy Bombardment in the Earth's atmosphere B. Marty bmarty@crpg.cnrs-nancy.fr A. Meibom Centre de Recherches Pétrographiques et Géochimiques, Nancy Universités, Nancy, France Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris, France The Lunar cratering record is consistent with the occurrence of a late heavy bombardment (LHB), which marked the end of terrestrial planet accretion 3.8 billion years ago. However, clear evidence of a LHB on Earth has not yet been identified. Based on a volatile budget of the terrestrial mantle, the atmosphere and hydrosphere we propose that the LHB did indeed occur on Earth and that we are breathing its aftermaths. The terrestrial atmosphere and hydrosphere is enriched in noble gases relative to the abundance of volatiles in the mantle. This enrichment is consistent with the mass delivered to Earth during the LHB, as recently proposed from dynamical modelling (Gomez et al., 2005), if this material comprised a few Kuiper-belt (cometary) objets (KBOs) mixed in with a population of largely chondritic (i.e. asteroidal) impactors. The fraction of KBOs necessary to account for the atmospheric composition is, however, much lower (<1%) than the one (~50%) inferred from modelling. Anders, E.: Pre-biotic organic matter from comets and asteroids: Nature, 342, 255–257, 1989. Arpigny, C., Jehin, E., Manfroid, J., Hutseméker, D., Schulz, R., Stüwe, J. A., Zucconi, J. M., and Ilyin, I.: Anomalous Nitrogen Isotope Ratio in Comets., Science, 301, 1522–1524, 2003. Ballentine, C.J., Marty, B., Lollar, B.S., and Cassidy, M.: Neon isotopes constrain convection and volatile origin in the Earth's mantle, Nature, 433, 33–38, 2005. Bar-Nun, A., Herman, G., Laufer, D., and Rappaport, M. L.: Trapping and release of gases by water ice and implications for icy bodies.: Icarus, 63, 317–332, 1985. Bell, D. R. and Rossman, G. R.: Water in the Earth's mantle : the role of anhydrous minerals: Science, 255, 1391–1397, 1992. Bland, P. A., Smith, T. B., Jull, A. J. T., Berry, F. J., Bewan, A. W. R., Cloudt, S., and Pillinger, C. T.: The flux of meteorites to the Earth over the last 50 000 years, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 283, 551–565, 1996. Bockelée-Morvan, D., Crovisier, J., Mumma, M. J., and Weaver, H. A.: The composition of cometary volatiles, in: Comets 2, edited by: Festou, M. C., Keller, H. U., Weaver, H. A., Univ. Arizona Press, 391–423, 2004. Culler, T. S., Becker, T. A., Muller, R. A., and Renne, P. R.: Lunar impact history from Ar-40/Ar-39 dating of glass spherules, Science, 287, 1785–1788, 2000. Dauphas, N.: The dual origin of the terrestrial atmosphere, Icarus, 165, 326–333, 2003. Delsemme, A. H. and Swings, P.: Gas hydrates in cometary nuclei and interstellar grains, Ann. Astrophys., 15, 1–6, 1952. Frei, R. and Rosing, M. T.: Search for traces of the late heavy bombardment on Earth-Results from high precision chromium isotopes, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 236, 28–40, 2005. Gomes, R., Levison, H. F., Tsiganis, K., and Morbidelli, A.: Origin of the cataclysmic Late Heavy Bombardment period of the terrestrial planets, Nature, 435, 466–469., 2005 Hartmann, W. K., Ryder, G., Dones, L., and Grinspoon, D.: The time-dependent intense bombardment of the primordial Earth/Moon system, in: Origin anf the Earth and Moon: Tucson, edited by: Canup, R. M. and Righter, K., Univ. Arizona Press, 493–451, 2002. Hashizume, K., Marty, B., and Wieler, R.: Analyses of nitrogen and argon in single lunar grains: towards a quantification of the asteroidal contribution to planetary surfaces, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 202, 201–216, 2002. Hersant, F., Gautier, D., and Hure, J. M.: A two-dimensional model for the primordial nebula constrained by D/H measurements in the solar system: Implications for the formation of giant planets, Astrophys. J., 554, 391–407, 2001. Igarashi, G.: Components of xenon in carbonaceous chondrites and fission component in the terrestrial atmosphere, Japan U. S. Seminar on Terrestrial Noble Gases: September 3–6, Yellowstone, p. Abstr. 20–23, 1986. Iro, N., Gautier, D., Hersant, F., Bockelee-Morvan, D., and Lunine, J. I.: An interpretation of the nitrogen deficiency in comets, Icarus, 161, 511–532, 2003. Jambon, A. and Zimmermann, J. L.: Water in Oceanic Basalts – Evidence for Dehydration of Recycled Crust, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 101, 323–331, 1990. Jewitt, D. C., Matthews, H. E., Owen, T., and Meier, R.: Measurements of C-12/C-13, N-14/N-15, and S-32/S-34 ratios in comet Hale-Bopp (C/1995 O1), Science, 278, 90–93, 1997. Keppler, H. and Bolfan-Casanova, N.: Thermodynamics of water solubility and partitioning, Water In Nominally Anhydrous Minerals, Rev. Mineral. Geochem., 62, 193–230, 2006. Koeberl, C.: Impact processes on the early Earth: Elements, 2, 211–216, 2006. Kunz, J., Staudacher, T., and Allègre, C. J.: Plutonium-fission xenon found in the Earth's mantle, Science, 280, 877–880, 1998. Kyte, F. T. and Wasson, J. T.: Accretion rate of extraterrestrial matter : irridium deposited 33 to 67 million years ago, Science, 232, 1225–1229, 1986. Love, S. and Brownlee, D. E.: A direct measurment of the terrestrial mass accretion rate of cosmic dust, Science, 262, 550–553, 1993. Lunine, J. I. and Stevenson, D. J.: Thermodynamics of clathrate hydrate at low and high pressures with application to the outer solar system, Astrophys. J., 58, 493–531, 1985. Marty, B.: Nitrogen content of the mantle inferred from N₂-Ar correlation in oceanic basalts, Nature, 377, 326–329, 1995. Marty, B. and Dauphas, N.: The nitrogen record of crust-mantle interaction from Archean to Present, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 206, 397–410, 2003. Marty, B. and Zimmermann, L.: Volatiles (He, C, N, Ar) in mid-ocean ridge basalts: Assesment of shallow-level fractionation and characterization of source composition, Geochim. Cosmochim. Acta, 63, 3619–3633, 1999. McDonough, W. F., Sun, S. S., Ringwood, A. E., Jagoutz, E., and Hofmann, A. W.:L Potassium, rubidium and cesium in the Earth and Moon and the evolution of the mantle of the Earth, Geochim. Cosmochim. Acta, 56, 1001–1012, 1992. McKeegan, K. D., Aleon, J., Bradley, J., et al.: Isotopic compositions of cometary matter returned by Stardust, Science, 314, 1724–1728, 2006. Morbidelli, A., Levison, H. F., Tsiganis, K., and Gomes, R.: Chaotic capture of Jupiter's Trojan asteroids in the early Solar System, Nature, 435, 462–465, 2005. Moreira, M., Kunz, J., and Allègre, C. J.: Rare gas systematics in Popping Rock : Isotopic and elemental compositions in the upper mantle, Science, 279, 1178–1181, 1998. Notesco, G. and Bar-Nun, A.: A $\sim $25 K temperature fo formation for the submicron ice grains which formed comets, Icarus, 175, 546–550, 2005. Owen, T., Bar-Nun, A., and Kleinfeld, I.: Possible cometary origin of heavy noble gases in the atmospheres of Venus, Earth and Mars, Nature, 358, 43–46, 1992. Owen, T., Mahaffy, P., Niemann, H. B., Atreya, S., Donahue, T., Bar-Nun, A., and de Pater, I.: A low-temperature origin for the planetesimals that formed Jupiter, Nature, 402, 269–270, 1999. Pepin, R. O.: On the origin and early evolution of terrestrial planetary atmospheres and meteoritic volatiles, Icarus, 92, 1–79, 1991. Porcelli, D. and Pepin, R. O.: Rare gas constraints on Early Earth history, in: Origin of the Earth and Moon: Tucson, edited by: Canup, R. M. and Righter, K., The University of Arizona Press, 435–458, 2000. Righter, K. and Drake, M. J.: Metal/silicate equilibrium in an homogeneous accreting Earth: New results for Re, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 146, 541–553, 1997. Ryder, G., Koeberl, C., and Mojzsis, S. J.: Heavy bombardment of the Earth at $\sim $3.85 Ga: The search for petrographic and geochemichal evidence, in: Origin of the Earth and Moon: Tucson, edited by: Canup, R. M. and Righter, K., Univ. Arizona Press, 475–492, 2000. Saal, A. E., Hauri, E. H., Langmuir, C. H., and Perfit, M. R.: Vapour undersaturation in primitive mid-ocean-ridge basalt and the volatile content of Earth's upper mantle, Nature, 419, 451–455, 2002. Schoenberg, R., Kamber, B. S., Collerson, K. D., and Moorbath, S.: Tungsten isotope evidence from 3.8-Gyr metamorphosed sediments for early bombardment of the Earth, Nature, 418, 403–405, 2002. Staudacher, T. and Allègre, C. J.: Terrestrial xenololy, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 60, 389–405, 1982. Tera, F., Papanastassiou, D. A., and Wasserburg, G. J.: Isotopic evidence for a terminal Lunar cataclysm, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 22, 1–21, 1974. Tolstikhin, I. N. and Marty, B.: The evolution of terrestrial volatiles: a view from helium, neon, argon and nitrogen isotope modelling, Chem. Geol., 147, 27–52, 1998. Trieloff, M. and Kunz, J., Isotope systematics of noble gases in the Earth's mantle: possible sources of primordial isotopes and implications for mantle structure, Phys. Planet. Int., 148, 13–38, 2005. Trieloff, M., Kunz, J., Clague, D. A., Harrisson, C. J., and Allègre, C. J.: The nature of pristine noble gases in mantle plumes, Science, 288, 1036–1038, 2000. Trull, T.: Influx and age constraints on the recycled cosmic dust explanation for high 3He/4He ratios at hotspot volcanos, in: Noble gas geochemistry and cosmochemistry: Tokyo, edited by: Matsuda, J. I., Terra Sci. Pub. Co., 77–88, 1994. Tsiganis, K., Gomes, R., Morbidelli, A., and Levison, H. F.: Origin of the orbital architecture of the giant planets of the Solar System, Nature, 435, 459–461, 2005. Yokochi, R. and Marty, B.: A determination of the neon isotopic composition of the deep mantle, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 225, 77–88, 2004. Yokochi, R. and Marty, B.: Geochemical constraints on mantle dynamics in the Hadean, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 238, 17–30, 2005. Zahnle, K. J.: Earth's earliest atmosphere, Elements, 2, 217–222, 2006. Zanhle, K. J., Kasting, J. F., and Pollack, J. B.: Evolution of a steam atmosphere during Earth's accretion, Icarus, 74, 62–97, 1988.