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Submitted on December 21, 2007
Accepted on July 2, 2008
Ferruginous Conditions Dominated Later Neoproterozoic Deep-Water Chemistry
Donald E. Canfield 1*,Simon W. Poulton 2,Andrew H. Knoll 3,Guy M. Narbonne 4,Gerry Ross 5,Tatiana Goldberg 2,Harald Strauss 6
1 Nordic Center for Earth Evolution (NordCEE) and Institute of Biology, Campusvej 55, University of Southern Denmark, 5230 Odense, Denmark. 2 School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Newcastle University, Drummond Building, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU, UK. 3 Botanical Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA. 4 Department of Geological Sciences and Geological Engineering, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario K7L 3N6, Canada. 5 Kupa’a Farm, Box 458, Kula, HI 96790, USA. 6 Institut Geowissenschaften und Lithosphärenforschung, JLU Giessen, Senckenbergstrasse 3, Giessen 35390, Germany.
* To whom correspondence should be addressed.
Donald E. Canfield , E-mail: dec{at}biology.sdu.dk
Earth’s surface chemical environment has evolved from anearly anoxic condition to the oxic state we have today. Transitionalbetween an earlier Proterozoic world with widespread deep wateranoxia and a Phanerozoic world with large, oxygen-utilizinganimals, the Neoproterozoic Era (1000 to 542 million years ago,Ma) plays a key role in this history. The details of NeoproterozoicEarth surface oxygenation, however, remain unclear. We reportthat through much of the later Neoproterozoic (<742 ±6 Ma), anoxia remained widespread beneath the mixed layer ofthe oceans; deeper water masses were sometimes sulfidic, butwere mainly Fe2+-enriched. These ferruginous conditions markeda return to ocean chemistry not seen for more than one billionyears of Earth history.
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