Detection of oxygen isotopic anomaly in terrestrial atmospheric carbonates and its implications to Mars

Shaheen, R.; Abramian, A.; Horn, Jackie D.; Domínguez, G.; Sullivan, R. C.; Thiemens, M. H.

doi:10.1073/pnas.1014399107

Cited by 30 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 59 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Carbonates have been formed under simulated martian conditions in the laboratory (Booth and Kieffer 1978;Shaheen et al 2010). The carbonate in fine dust could result from relatively dry conditions where several hundred monolayers of H 2 O around dust grains generate carbonate over geologic time.…”

Section: Current Martian Conditionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Geochemistry of Carbonates on Mars: Implications for Climate History and Nature of Aqueous Environments

et al. 2012

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Ongoing research on martian meteorites and a new set of observations of carbonate minerals provided by an unprecedented series of robotic missions to Mars in the past 15 years help define new constraints on the history of martian climate with important cross- cutting themes including: the CO 2 budget of Mars, the role of Mg-, Fe-rich fluids on Mars, and the interplay between carbonate formation and acidity.Carbonate minerals have now been identified in a wide range of localities on Mars as well as in several martian meteorites. The martian meteorites contain carbonates in low abundances (<1 vol.%) and with a wide range of chemistries. Carbonates have also been identified by remote sensing instruments on orbiting spacecraft in several surface locations as well as in low concentrations (2-5 wt.%) in the martian dust. The Spirit rover also identified an outcrop with 16 to 34 wt.% carbonate material in the Columbia Hills of Gusev Crater that strongly resembled the composition of carbonate found in martian meteorite ALH 84001. Finally, the Phoenix lander identified concentrations of 3-6 wt.% carbonate in the soils of the northern plains.The carbonates discovered to date do not clearly indicate the past presence of a dense Noachian atmosphere, but instead suggest localized hydrothermal aqueous environments with limited water availability that existed primarily in the early to mid-Noachian followed by low levels of carbonate formation from thin films of transient water from the late Noachian to the present. The prevalence of carbonate along with evidence for active carbonate precipitation suggests that a global acidic chemistry is unlikely and a more complex relationship between acidity and carbonate formation is present.

show abstract

Section: Current Martian Conditionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Geochemistry of Carbonates on Mars: Implications for Climate History and Nature of Aqueous Environments

et al. 2012

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The exact process responsible for their formation is not clear, although low-temperature aqueous precipitation, biogenic production, evaporation, and high-temperature reactions are all candidate processes (9)(10)(11)(12)(13). Decoding the fingerprints of various oxygen-carrying reservoirs on Mars (atmosphere-hydrosphere-geosphere) and how they interact from δ 18 O alone is nearly impossible because of the lack of direct information on the isotopic composition of the primary O-carrying reservoirs in the carbonate system (CO 2 3 , and H 2 O 2 has been successfully used to investigate physicochemical and photochemical processes in terrestrial and extraterrestrial materials (14)(15)(16)(17)(18). In this study, we used five stable isotopes of carbonates ( 12 C, 13 C, 16 O, 17 O, and 18 O) on Ca-and Fe-rich phases to decipher atmosphere-hydrosphere interactions and Martian CO 2 /CO 3 geochemical cycling.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The O-isotopic anomaly (Δ 17 O = δ 17 O − 0.52 × δ 18 O) observed in O 3 , SO 4 , NO 3 , CO 3 , and H 2 O 2 has been successfully used to investigate physicochemical and photochemical processes in terrestrial and extraterrestrial materials (14)(15)(16)(17)(18). In this study, we used five stable isotopes of carbonates ( 12 C, 13 C, 16 O, 17 O, and 18 O) on Ca-and Fe-rich phases to decipher atmosphere-hydrosphere interactions and Martian CO 2 /CO 3 geochemical cycling. This high-precision multi-O-isotope analysis of secondary minerals was coordinated with detailed petrographic and ion microprobe analyses.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Decoding the fingerprints of various oxygen-carrying reservoirs on Mars (atmosphere-hydrosphere-geosphere) and how they interact from δ 18 O alone is nearly impossible because of the lack of direct information on the isotopic composition of the primary O-carrying reservoirs in the carbonate system (CO 2 3 , and H 2 O 2 has been successfully used to investigate physicochemical and photochemical processes in terrestrial and extraterrestrial materials (14)(15)(16)(17)(18). In this study, we used five stable isotopes of carbonates ( 12 C, 13 C, 16 O, 17 O, and 18 O) on Ca-and Fe-rich phases to decipher atmosphere-hydrosphere interactions and Martian CO 2 /CO 3 geochemical cycling. This high-precision multi-O-isotope analysis of secondary minerals was coordinated with detailed petrographic and ion microprobe analyses.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Carbonate formation events in ALH 84001 trace the evolution of the Martian atmosphere

Shaheen

Niles

Chong

et al. 2014

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Carbonate minerals provide critical information for defining atmosphere-hydrosphere interactions. Carbonate minerals in the Martian meteorite ALH 84001 have been dated to ∼3.9 Ga, and both C and O-triple isotopes can be used to decipher the planet's climate history. Here we report Δ 17 O, δ 18 O, and δ 13 C data of ALH 84001 of at least two varieties of carbonates, using a stepped acid dissolution technique paired with ion microprobe analyses to specifically target carbonates from distinct formation events and constrain the Martian atmosphere-hydrosphere-geosphere interactions and surficial aqueous alterations. These results indicate the presence of a Ca-rich carbonate phase enriched in 18 O that formed sometime after the primary aqueous event at 3.9 Ga. The phases showed excess 17 O (0.7‰) that captured the atmosphere-regolith chemical reservoir transfer, as well as CO 2 , O 3 , and H 2 O isotopic interactions at the time of formation of each specific carbonate. The carbon isotopes preserved in the Ca-rich carbonate phase indicate that the Noachian atmosphere of Mars was substantially depleted in 13 C compared with the modern atmosphere.Martian meteorite | oxygen isotope anomaly | aqueous interaction | carbon isotope | photochemistry G eological evidence suggests that early Mars was sufficiently warm for liquid water to flow on the surface for at least brief periods, if not longer (1). Identifying the nature and duration of warmer conditions on the Martian surface is one of the key pieces of information for understanding atmosphere-hydrosphere-geosphere interactions, the evolution of the atmosphere, and potential past habitability. A better understanding of the evolution of the Martian atmosphere and, in particular, the behavior of its primary component, CO 2 , provides a means for characterizing the nature of the ancient Martian environment. The amount of CO 2 present in the atmosphere should provide critical insight into the characteristics of the Martian climate, with a denser atmosphere being more likely to be able to support prolonged warmer temperatures (2, 3).The Martian meteorite ALH 84001 is a critical source for understanding the history of the Martian atmosphere, as it is the oldest known rock (crystallographic age ∼4.09 ± 0.03 Ga) (4), and its carbonate fractions (<1% wt/wt) are considered to have preserved the carbon isotope signature of the ancient atmosphere ∼3.9 Ga ago (5). These carbonates are chemically (Mg-, Ca-, and FeMn rich) and isotopically (δ 13 C VPDB = 27-64, where VPDB stands for Vienna Pee Dee Belemnite, and δ 18 O SMOW = −10-27‰, where SMOW stands for Standard Mean Ocean Water) heterogeneous on micrometer scales; carbon and oxygen isotopes show a covariant relationship that is correlated with Mg content of the mineral (6-8). The exact process responsible for their formation is not clear, although low-temperature aqueous precipitation, biogenic production, evaporation, and high-temperature reactions are all candidate processes (9-13). Decoding the fingerprints of various oxygen-carry...

show abstract

“…The ice model (Dominguez, 2010) underscores the role of ices, which bear similarity to the wellknown polar stratospheric clouds that exert a strong mediating factor in the chemistry of the winter polar atmospheres. As will be discussed, recent atmospheric and potentially Martian meteoritic measurements have shown the importance of grain surface nanofilm layer chemical reactions in heterogeneous chemical transformational processes (Shaheen et al, 2010).…”

Section: Applications Of Mass-independent Isotopic Effectsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mass-Independent Isotopic Composition of Terrestrial and Extraterrestrial Materials

Thiemens

Shaheen

2014

Treatise on Geochemistry

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Detection of oxygen isotopic anomaly in terrestrial atmospheric carbonates and its implications to Mars

Cited by 30 publications

References 59 publications

Geochemistry of Carbonates on Mars: Implications for Climate History and Nature of Aqueous Environments

Geochemistry of Carbonates on Mars: Implications for Climate History and Nature of Aqueous Environments

Carbonate formation events in ALH 84001 trace the evolution of the Martian atmosphere

Mass-Independent Isotopic Composition of Terrestrial and Extraterrestrial Materials

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About