A Brief History of Earth

opengeology.org/historicalgeology/a-brief-history-of-earth/

Based on An Introduction to Geology, Chapter 8: Earth History

Geologic time on Earth, represented circularly, to

show the individual time divisions and important
events. Ga=billion years ago, Ma=million years
ago.

Entire courses and careers have been based on the wide-ranging topics covering Earth’s
history. Throughout the long history of Earth, change has been the norm. Looking back in
time, an untrained eye would see many unfamiliar life forms and terrains. The main topics
studied in Earth history are paleogeography, paleontology, and paleoecology and
paleoclimatology—respectively, past landscapes, past organisms, past ecosystems, and
past environments. This chapter will cover (briefly) the origin of the universe and the 4.6
billion year history of Earth. It will act as a guide, linking out to other chapters, case
studies, and sections in this book.

Origin of the Universe

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White dwarfs are hot star embers, formed by packing most of a dying star’s mass into a
small and dense object about the size of Earth. Larger stars may explode in a supernova
that packs their mass even tighter to become neutron stars. Neutron stars are so dense
that protons combine with electrons to form neutrons. The largest stars collapse their
mass even further, becoming objects so dense that light cannot escape their gravitational
grasp. These are the infamous black holes and the details of the physics of what occurs
in them are still up for debate.

Origin of the Solar System: The Nebular Hypothesis

Small protoplanetary discs in the Orion

Nebula

Our solar system formed as the same time as our Sun as described in the nebular
hypothesis. The nebular hypothesis is the idea that a spinning cloud of dust made of
mostly light elements, called a nebula, flattened into a protoplanetary disk, and became a
solar system consisting of a star with orbiting planets. The spinning nebula collected the
vast majority of material in its center, which is why the sun Accounts for over 99% of the
mass in our solar system.

Planet Arrangement and Segregation

This disk is asymmetric, possibly because of a

large gas giant planet orbiting relatively far from
the star.

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As our solar system formed, the nebular cloud of dispersed particles developed distinct
temperature zones. Temperatures were very high close to the center, only allowing
condensation of metals and silicate minerals with high melting points. Farther from the
Sun, the temperatures were lower, allowing the condensation of lighter gaseous
molecules such as methane, ammonia, carbon dioxide, and water. This temperature
differentiation resulted in the inner four planets of the solar system becoming rocky, and
the outer four planets becoming gas giants.

Image by the ALMA telescope of HL Tauri and

its protoplanetary disk, showing grooves formed
as planets absorb material in the disk.

Both rocky and gaseous planets have a similar growth model. Particles of dust, floating in
the disc were attracted to each other by static charges and eventually, gravity. As the
clumps of dust became bigger, they interacted with each other—colliding, sticking, and
forming proto-planets. The planets continued to grow over the course of many thousands
or millions of years, as material from the protoplanetary disc was added. Both rocky and
gaseous planets started with a solid core. Rocky planets built more rock on that core,
while gas planets added gas and ice. Ice giants formed later and on the furthest edges of
the disc, accumulating less gas and more ice. That is why the gas-giant planets Jupiter
and Saturn are composed of mostly hydrogen and helium gas, more than 90%. The ice
giants Uranus and Neptune are composed of mostly methane ices and only about 20%
hydrogen and helium gases.

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Origin of Earth’s Crust

The global map of the depth of the moho, or

thickness of the crust.

As Earth cooled from its molten state, minerals started to crystallize and settle resulting in
a separation of minerals based on density and the creation of the crust, mantle, and core.
The earliest Earth was chiefly molten material and would have been rounded by
gravitational forces so it resembled a ball of lava floating in space. As the outer part of the
Earth slowly cooled, the high melting-point minerals (see Bowen’s Reaction Series in
Chapter 4) formed solid slabs of early crust. These slabs were probably unstable and
easily reabsorbed into the liquid magma until the Earth cooled enough to allow numerous
larger fragments to form a thin primitive crust. Scientists generally assume this crust was
oceanic and mafic in composition, and littered with impacts, much like the Moon’s current
crust. There is still some debate over when plate tectonics started, which would have led
to the formation of continental and felsic crust. Regardless of this, as Earth cooled and
solidified, less dense felsic minerals floated to the surface of the Earth to form the crust,
while the denser mafic and ultramafic materials sank to form the mantle and the highest-
density iron and nickel sank into the core. This differentiated the Earth from a
homogenous planet into a heterogeneous one with layers of felsic crust, mafic crust,
ultramafic mantle, and iron and nickel core.

Origin of the Moon

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 Dark side of the Moon

Several unique features of Earth’s Moon have prompted scientists to develop the current
hypothesis about its formation. The Earth and Moon are tidally locked, meaning that as
the Moon orbits, one side always faces the Earth and the opposite side is not visible to
us. Also and most importantly, the chemical compositions of the Earth and Moon show
nearly identical isotope ratios and volatile content. Apollo missions returned from the
Moon with rocks that allowed scientists to conduct very precise comparisons between
Moon and Earth rocks. Other bodies in the solar system and meteorites do not share the
same degree of similarity and show much higher variability. If the Moon and Earth formed
together, this would explain why they are so chemically similar.

Artist’s concept of the giant impact from a Mars-

sized object that could have formed the moon.

Many ideas have been proposed for the origin of the Moon: The Moon could have been
captured from another part of the solar system and formed in place together with the
Earth, or the Moon could have been ripped out of the early Earth. None of proposed
explanations can account for all the evidence. The currently prevailing hypothesis is the
giant-impact hypothesis. It proposes a body about half of Earth’s size must have shared
at least parts of Earth’s orbit and collided with it, resulting in a violent mixing and

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scattering of material from both objects. Both bodies would be composed of a
combination of materials, with more of the lower density splatter coalescing into the
Moon. This may explain why the Earth has a higher density and thicker core than the
Moon.

Watch Video At: https://youtu.be/UIKmSQqp8wY

Computer simulation of the evolution of the Moon (2 minutes).

Origin of Earth’s Water

Water vapor leaves comet 67P/Churyumov–

Gerasimenko.

Explanations for the origin of Earth’s water include volcanic outgassing, comets, and
meteorites. The volcanic outgassing hypothesis for the origin of Earth’s water is that it

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originated from inside the planet, and emerged via tectonic processes as vapor
associated with volcanic eruptions. Since all volcanic eruptions contain some water
vapor, at times more than 1% of the volume, these alone could have created Earth’s
surface water. Another likely source of water was from space. Comets are a mixture of
dust and ice, with some or most of that ice being frozen water. Seemingly dry meteors
can contain small but measurable amounts of water, usually trapped in their mineral
structures. During heavy bombardment periods later in Earth’s history, its cooled surface
was pummeled by comets and meteorites, which could be why so much water exists
above ground. There isn’t a definitive answer for what process is the source of ocean
water. Earth’s water isotopically matches water found in meteorites much better than that
of comets. However, it is hard to know if Earth processes could have changed the water’s
isotopic signature over the last 4-plus billion years. It is possible that all three sources
contributed to the origin of Earth’s water.

Archean Eon

Artist’s impression of the Archean.

The Archean Eon, which lasted from 4.0–2.5 billion years ago, is named after the Greek
word for beginning. This eon represents the beginning of the rock record. Although there
is current evidence that rocks and minerals existed during the Hadean Eon , the Archean
has a much more robust rock and fossil record.

Late Heavy Bombardment

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