Year: 2011
Type: article
Abstract: Many aspects of the Earth’s early sulfur cycle, from the origin of mass anomalous fractionations to the scale and \ndegree of biological involvement, remain poorly understood. We have been studying the nature of multiple sulfur isotope \n(^(32)S, ^(33)S, and ^(34)S) signals using a novel combination of scanning high-resolution low-temperature superconductivity \nSQUID microscopy and secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) techniques in a suite of samples from distal slope and \nbasinal environments adjacent to a major Late Archean-age (~2.6-2.52 Ga) carbonate platform. Coupled with petrography, \nthese techniques allow us to interrogate, at the same microscopic scale, the complex history of mineralization in \nsamples containing diverse sulfide-bearing mineral components. Because of a general lack of Archean sulfate \nminerals, we focused our analyses on early diagenetic pyrite nodules, precipitated in surface sediments. This allows us to \nassay fractionations by controlling for isotope mass balance.
Language: English
Subfield: Paleontology
Field: Earth and Planetary Sciences
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2679976774