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Snowball Earth ocean chemistry driven by extensive ridge volcanism during Rodinia breakup

Nature Geoscience volume 9, pages 242–248 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

During Neoproterozoic Snowball Earth glaciations, the oceans gained massive amounts of alkalinity, culminating in the deposition of massive cap carbonates on deglaciation. Changes in terrestrial runoff associated with both breakup of the Rodinia supercontinent and deglaciation can explain some, but not all of the requisite changes in ocean chemistry. Submarine volcanism along shallow ridges formed during supercontinent breakup results in the formation of large volumes of glassy hyaloclastite, which readily alters to palagonite. Here we estimate fluxes of calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, silica and bicarbonate associated with these shallow-ridge processes, and argue that extensive submarine volcanism during the breakup of Rodinia made an important contribution to changes in ocean chemistry during Snowball Earth glaciations. We use Monte Carlo simulations to show that widespread hyaloclastite alteration under near-global sea-ice cover could lead to Ca2+ and Mg2+ supersaturation over the course of the glaciation that is sufficient to explain the volume of cap carbonates deposited. Furthermore, our conservative estimates of phosphorus release are sufficient to explain the observed P:Fe ratios in sedimentary iron formations from this time. This large phosphorus release may have fuelled primary productivity, which in turn would have contributed to atmospheric O2 rises that followed Snowball Earth episodes.

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Figure 1: Evolution of spreading-ridge systems during the late Neoproterozoic.
Figure 2: Summary of major global volcanic events during the Tonian, Cryogenian and early Ediacaran periods, in relation to major glaciations (blue) and continental breakup events (beige).
Figure 3: Monte Carlo simulations showing estimated Ca and Mg fluxes into the ‘snowball’ ocean, and resulting thicknesses of carbonate and dolostone.
Figure 4: Monte Carlo simulations for estimated phosphorus fluxes into a typical ‘snowball’ ocean.

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Acknowledgements

E.J.R. acknowledges Australian Research Council Laureate Fellowship FL1201 00050. We are grateful to R. S. J. Sparks, R. N. Taylor, C. N. Trueman, T. Lenton, I. Fairchild and G. Shields-Zhou for helpful discussions and suggestions. Supplementary Fig. 1 was illustrated by G. Hincks.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ocean and Earth Science, University of Southampton, European Way, Southampton SO14 3ZH, UK

    T. M. Gernon, T. Tyrrell, E. J. Rohling & M. R. Palmer

  2. School of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol, Bristol BS8 1RJ, UK

    T. K. Hincks

  3. Research School of Earth Sciences, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory 2601, Australia

    E. J. Rohling

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  1. T. M. Gernon
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Contributions

T.M.G. conceived and managed the research. T.K.H. developed and performed simulations with inputs from T.M.G., T.T., M.R.P. and E.J.R. The manuscript was written by T.M.G., with important contributions from all co-authors.

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Correspondence to T. M. Gernon.

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Gernon, T., Hincks, T., Tyrrell, T. et al. Snowball Earth ocean chemistry driven by extensive ridge volcanism during Rodinia breakup. Nature Geosci 9, 242–248 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2632

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