Long Mantle Mixing Times for the early Earth Inferred from Convection Models with Grain-Damage

Abstract:

Mantle dynamics on the Hadean and Archean Earth, particularly whether plate tectonics was in operation or not, is hotly debated. One important constraint comes from evidence for long mantle mixing timescales in the early Earth based on observations of early-formed geochemical heterogeneities. Specifically, ¹⁴²Nd anomalies recorded in 3.8 to 3.4 Ga rocks from southwest Greenland [e.g. 1] and 2.7 Ga rocks from the Superior Province (Canada) [2] indicate that chemically heterogeneous reservoirs, formed during the first ~ 10-100 million years of Earths’ history, survived their remixing into the mantle for over 1 Gyr. Such a long mantle mixing time is difficult to explain with a traditional model of plate tectonics, where plate speeds increase significantly in the past due to a hotter mantle, thus prompting appeals to stagnant lid convection on the early Earth [e.g. 2]. However, a new model for generating plate tectonics from mantle convection based on grainsize reduction (called grain-damage) proposes that plate speeds may have decreased with increasing mantle temperature. Higher mantle temperatures lead to higher grain-growth rates that inhibit the formation of weak lithospheric shear zones. As a result, plate boundaries are more viscous and provide a stronger resistance to plate motions, and thus mantle-mixing times in the mobile lid regime may still be long even at Hadean or Archean mantle temperatures. We use new numerical models of convection with grain-damage to constrain mantle-mixing times for the early Earth with the effects of grainsize variation included. We find that mantle mixing times for mobile lid convection remain long as mantle temperature increases because of faster grain-growth rates in the mantle and lithosphere. Therefore the preservation of chemical heterogeneities for over 1 Gyr in the Hadean-Archean mantle is not inconsistent with the operation of mobile lid convection and subduction at this time. Early Earth subduction may still have differed significantly from modern day plate tectonics, but our results show that stagnant lid convection is not necessary to explain the geochemical observations.

[1] Rizo et al., 2013, EPSL. [2] Debaille et al., 2013, EPSL.