News tagged with zircons


Plate tectonics started over 4 billion years ago, geochemists report

Plate tectonics started over 4 billion years ago, geochemists report

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Nov 26, 2008 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (23) | comments 0

(PhysOrg.com) -- A new picture of the early Earth is emerging, including the surprising finding that plate tectonics may have started more than 4 billion years ago — much earlier than scientists had believed, ...





Search results for zircons


Ancient mineral shows early Earth climate tough on continents

Ancient mineral shows early Earth climate tough on continents

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Jun 13, 2008 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (31) | comments 0

A new analysis of ancient minerals called zircons suggests that a harsh climate may have scoured and possibly even destroyed the surface of the Earth's earliest continents.


Bias in the rock record?

Bias in the rock record?

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Jan 14, 2009 | popularity 3.8 / 5 (6) | comments 0

(PhysOrg.com) -- The fossil record is known to be biased by the unevenness of geographical and stratigraphical sampling, and the lack of exposed rocks containing fossils. In a recent Perspective in Science [2 Jan ...


Crystals on meteorite hold a key to understanding building blocks of planets

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Aug 03, 2007 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (11) | comments 0

A University of Toronto-led study has uncovered tiny zircon crystals in a meteorite originating from Vesta (a large asteroid between Mars and Jupiter), shedding light on the formation of planetesimals, small astronomical ...


There was no such thing as hell on Earth

Space & Earth /

created Nov 18, 2005 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (12) | comments 0

New Australian National University research is set to radically overturn the conventional wisdom that early Earth was a hellish planet barren of continents. An international research team led by Professor Mark Harrison of ...


New study: Hell not as bad as we thought

New study: Hell not as bad as we thought

Space & Earth /

created May 06, 2005 | popularity 4 / 5 (1) | comments 0

The very earliest years of Earth have long been presumed hot, violent and terrible – so much so that the era from 4.5 billion years to 4 billion years ago is known as the Hadean Eon, or Hellish time. However, a f ...


New Method of Dating Oceanic Crust Is Most Accurate So Far

New Method of Dating Oceanic Crust Is Most Accurate So Far

Other Sciences /

created Oct 31, 2005 | popularity 3 / 5 (2) | comments 0

A newly developed method that detects tiny bits of zircon in rock reliably predicts the age of ocean crust more than 99 percent of the time, making the technique the most accurate so far.


Oldest Known Rock on Earth Discovered

Researchers find oldest rocks on Earth

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Sep 25, 2008 | popularity 4.2 / 5 (18) | comments 3

Canadian bedrock more than four billion years old may be the oldest known section of the Earth's early crust. Scientists at the Carnegie Institution used geochemical methods to obtain an age of 4.28 billion ...


A secondary electron microscopy image of a zircon from volcanic ash, about 100 microns across

Uranium/lead dating provides most accurate date yet for Earth's largest extinction

Space & Earth /

created Sep 16, 2004 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (4) | comments 0

A new study by geologists at the Berkeley Geochronology Center and the University of California, Berkeley, improves upon a widely used dating technique, opening the possibility of a vastly more accurate time ...



List of search results for zircons