TY - JOUR
T1 - A magma ocean origin to divergent redox evolutions of rocky planetary bodies and early atmospheres
AU - Deng, Jie
AU - Du, Zhixue
AU - Karki, Bijaya B.
AU - Ghosh, Dipta B.
AU - Lee, Kanani K.M.
N1 - Funding Information:
The research is supported by NSF grants (EAR-1321956 and EAR-1551348 to K.K.M.L. and EAR 1764140 to B.B.K.) and from Chinese Academy of Sciences (No. 29Y93301701 and 51Y8340107 to Z.D.). We benefited from discussions with Colin Jackson and Lars Stixrude. The computing resources were provided by the Yale Center for Research Computing (thanking Kaylea Nelson for guidance) and Louisiana State University High Performance Computing. K.K.M.L.’s effort was partially supported under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Energy by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory under Contract DE-AC52-07NA27344.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020, The Author(s).
PY - 2020/12/1
Y1 - 2020/12/1
N2 - Magma oceans were once ubiquitous in the early solar system, setting up the initial conditions for different evolutionary paths of planetary bodies. In particular, the redox conditions of magma oceans may have profound influence on the redox state of subsequently formed mantles and the overlying atmospheres. The relevant redox buffering reactions, however, remain poorly constrained. Using first-principles simulations combined with thermodynamic modeling, we show that magma oceans of Earth, Mars, and the Moon are likely characterized with a vertical gradient in oxygen fugacity with deeper magma oceans invoking more oxidizing surface conditions. This redox zonation may be the major cause for the Earth’s upper mantle being more oxidized than Mars’ and the Moon’s. These contrasting redox profiles also suggest that Earth’s early atmosphere was dominated by CO2 and H2O, in contrast to those enriched in H2O and H2 for Mars, and H2 and CO for the Moon.
AB - Magma oceans were once ubiquitous in the early solar system, setting up the initial conditions for different evolutionary paths of planetary bodies. In particular, the redox conditions of magma oceans may have profound influence on the redox state of subsequently formed mantles and the overlying atmospheres. The relevant redox buffering reactions, however, remain poorly constrained. Using first-principles simulations combined with thermodynamic modeling, we show that magma oceans of Earth, Mars, and the Moon are likely characterized with a vertical gradient in oxygen fugacity with deeper magma oceans invoking more oxidizing surface conditions. This redox zonation may be the major cause for the Earth’s upper mantle being more oxidized than Mars’ and the Moon’s. These contrasting redox profiles also suggest that Earth’s early atmosphere was dominated by CO2 and H2O, in contrast to those enriched in H2O and H2 for Mars, and H2 and CO for the Moon.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85083859393&partnerID=8YFLogxK
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U2 - 10.1038/s41467-020-15757-0
DO - 10.1038/s41467-020-15757-0
M3 - Article
C2 - 32332725
AN - SCOPUS:85083859393
SN - 2041-1723
VL - 11
JO - Nature communications
JF - Nature communications
IS - 1
M1 - 2007
ER -