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Composition of continental crust altered by the emergence of land plants

Nature Geoscience volume 15, pages 735–740 (2022)Cite this article

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Abstract

The evolution of land plants during the Palaeozoic era transformed Earth’s biosphere. Because the Earth’s surface and interior are linked by tectonic processes, the linked evolution of the biosphere and sedimentary rocks should be recorded as a near-contemporary shift in the composition of the continental crust. To test this hypothesis, we assessed the isotopic signatures of zircon formed at subduction zones where marine sediments are transported into the mantle, thereby recording interactions between surface environments and the deep Earth. Using oxygen and lutetium–hafnium isotopes of magmatic zircon that respectively track surface weathering (time independent) and radiogenic decay (time dependent), we find a correlation in the composition of continental crust after 430 Myr ago, which is coeval with the onset of enhanced complexity and stability in sedimentary systems related to the evolution of vascular plants. The expansion of terrestrial vegetation brought channelled sand-bed and meandering rivers, muddy floodplains and thicker soils, lengthening the duration of weathering before final marine deposition. Collectively, our results suggest that the evolution of vascular plants coupled the degree of weathering and timescales of sediment routing to depositional basins where they were subsequently subducted and melted. The late Palaeozoic isotopic shift of zircon indicates that the greening of the continents was recorded in the deep Earth.

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Fig. 1: εHf versus δ18O in zircon since 720 Ma.
Fig. 2: Statistical relationship between εHf and δ18O of zircon.
Fig. 3: Synthesis of palaeontological and sedimentological data from the early Palaeozoic.
Fig. 4: Schematic model of fluvial systems both before and after the development of land plants.

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The data associated with this paper are available via FigShare at https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.20092598.v1.

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Acknowledgements

This paper benefited greatly from discussions with B. Keller. C.J.S., X.W. and M.S. were supported by the Natural Sciences and Environment Research Council, Discovery Grant RGPIN-2020-05639. T.R.I.M. was supported by the Natural Sciences and Environment Research Council, Undergraduate Student Research Award 551207 – 2020 with additional funding provided by L. Godin. T.M.G. and T.H. were supported by the Turing Institute under the EPSRC grant EP/N510129/1. N.S.D. and W.J.M. were supported by NERC grant NE/T00696X. G.-M.L. acknowledges support from the State Scholarship Fund of China Scholarship Council (202006410023).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Geological Sciences and Geological Engineering, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada

    Christopher J. Spencer, Xi Wang, Taylor Rae I. Morrell, Peir K. Pufahl, Marina Seraine & Gui-Mei Lu

  2. Department of Earth Sciences, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    Neil S. Davies & William J. McMahon

  3. School of Ocean and Earth Science, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK

    Thomas M. Gernon & Thea Hincks

  4. School of Geosciences, University of Aberdeen, King’s College, Aberdeen, UK

    Alexander Brasier

  5. State Key Laboratory of Geological Processes and Mineral Resources, School of Earth Sciences, China University of Geosciences, Wuhan, China

    Gui-Mei Lu

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Contributions

C.J.S. conceived of the idea and, with the help of X.W., T.R.I.M., M.S., N.S.D. and W.J.M., compiled and interpreted data. C.J.S., X.W., T.H., T.M.G. and G.-M.L. assisted with the statistical analysis. C.J.S., X.W., W.J.M. and T.H. constructed the figures. C.J.S., N.S.D. and T.M.G. wrote the manuscript with input from X.W., W.J.M., T.R.I.M., T.H., P.K.P., A.B., M.S. and G.-M.L.

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Correspondence to Christopher J. Spencer.

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Extended data

Extended Data Fig. 1 Secular plot of δ18O in mudrocks and zircon during different Periods in the Palaeozoic.

Note that no systematic or long-term change in shale composition is present throughout the Phanerozoic. Mudrock δ18O data are from refs. 27,76 and (ref. 77). Uncertainty bars are 2 S.D.

Extended Data Fig. 2 Transdimensional Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulation of the zircon crustal residence versus δ18O slope, r2, and correlation coefficients.

MCMC step change results demonstrate a statistically valid change point at 450-410 Myr ago with a maximum likelihood at 440 Myr ago (using one million simulations).

Extended Data Fig. 3 Transdimensional Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulation and conjugate partitioned recursion (CPR) of the percentage of mudrocks through time.

MCMC yields a statistically valid change point 430–420 Myr ago with a maximum likelihood at 423 Myr ago (using one million simulations) whereas CPR shows a change point at 430 Myr ago. Data from ref. 17.

Extended Data Fig. 4 Crustal residence time vs δ18O in zircon through time.

This includes (A) the Archean Eon (pre-2500 Myr ago) and major supercontinent assembly events including (B) Nuna from 2200 to 1700 Myr ago, (C) Columbia from 1700 to 1200 Myr ago, (D) Rodinia from 1200 to 900 Myr ago, Pangea from 400 to 250 Myr ago, and (F) post-Pangea assembly from 250 Myr ago to the present.

Extended Data Fig. 5 Crustal residence versus δ18O in zircon since 720 Myr ago (A–E).

It is assumed here that all primary magmas are initially derived from the mantle with a δ18O of ~5.5‰ and a crustal residence time less than ~250 Myr (approximating the depleted mantle compositions61). The degree of correlation between εHf and δ18O in zircon is markedly different in the latter two panels (A and B), with the panels covering pre-430 Myr ago showing greater degrees of scatter and weak correlations. (F) r2 versus slope of the regression from 700 Myr ago to 0 Myr ago in 10 Myr steps using a rolling window.

Extended Data Fig. 6 Statistical relationship between crustal residence time (CR) and δ18O through time.

A step-change algorithm (conjugate partitioned recursion67) demonstrates a statistically valid step change in the slope, r2 and correlation coefficients at either 450 Myr ago (linear regression slope and Pearson’s correlation) or 430 Myr ago (r2 and Spearman’s rank correlation). The increase in vascular plants at 450 Myr ago and the increase in mudrock percentage at 430 Myr ago are shown as vertical dashed lines.

Source data

Source Data Fig. 1

Compiled zircon U–Pb, Lu–Hf, and δ18O database.

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Spencer, C.J., Davies, N.S., Gernon, T.M. et al. Composition of continental crust altered by the emergence of land plants. Nat. Geosci. 15, 735–740 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-022-00995-2

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