The expanding network of mineral chemistry throughout earth history reveals global shifts in crustal chemistry during the Proterozoic

Eli K Moore; Josh J Golden; Shaunna M Morrison; Jihua Hao; Stephanie J Spielman

doi:10.1038/s41598-022-08650-x

The expanding network of mineral chemistry throughout earth history reveals global shifts in crustal chemistry during the Proterozoic

Sci Rep. 2022 Mar 23;12(1):4956. doi: 10.1038/s41598-022-08650-x.

Authors

Eli K Moore¹, Josh J Golden², Shaunna M Morrison³, Jihua Hao^{4

5

6}, Stephanie J Spielman⁷

Affiliations

¹ Department of Environmental Science, School of Earth and the Environment, Rowan University, Glassboro, NJ, USA. mooreek@rowan.edu.
² Department of Geosciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA.
³ Earth and Planets Laboratory, Carnegie Institution for Science, Washington, DC, USA.
⁴ CAS Key Laboratory of Crust-Mantle Materials and Environments, School of Earth and Space Sciences, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China.
⁵ CAS Center for Excellence in Comparative Planetology, USTC, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, China.
⁶ Department of Marine and Coastal Sciences, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, USA.
⁷ Department of Biological Sciences, College of Science and Mathematics, Rowan University, Glassboro, NJ, USA.

Abstract

Earth surface redox conditions are intimately linked to the co-evolution of the geosphere and biosphere. Minerals provide a record of Earth's evolving surface and interior chemistry in geologic time due to many different processes (e.g. tectonic, volcanic, sedimentary, oxidative, etc.). Here, we show how the bipartite network of minerals and their shared constituent elements expanded and evolved over geologic time. To further investigate network expansion over time, we derive and apply a novel metric (weighted mineral element electronegativity coefficient of variation; wMEE_CV) to quantify intra-mineral electronegativity variation with respect to redox. We find that element electronegativity and hard soft acid base (HSAB) properties are central factors in mineral redox chemistry under a wide range of conditions. Global shifts in mineral element electronegativity and HSAB associations represented by wMEE_CV changes at 1.8 and 0.6 billion years ago align with decreased continental elevation followed by the transition from the intermediate ocean and glaciation eras to post-glaciation, increased atmospheric oxygen in the Phanerozoic, and enhanced continental weathering. Consequently, network analysis of mineral element electronegativity and HSAB properties reveal that orogenic activity, evolving redox state of the mantle, planetary oxygenation, and climatic transitions directly impacted the evolving chemical complexity of Earth's crust.

Abstract

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