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Geologists studying some of the planet’s oldest volcanic rocks have uncovered new evidence that water was playing a major role in shaping Earth’s interior and driving volcanic activity more than three billion years ago.
An international research team, led by Adelaide University geochemist Dr Eric Vandenburg, analysed ancient rocks from Western Australia's Pilbara Craton. They found signs that water had travelled deep beneath the Earth's surface before helping to generate magmas that formed volcanoes like those found in the Pacific “Ring of Fire” today.
The findings, published in Nature Communications, suggest that Earth was already running a version of the water-recycling processes that shape the planet today, despite conditions being dramatically different during the planet’s infancy.
Dr Vandenburg, from the School of Physics, Chemistry and Earth Sciences, said the research provides a rare window into Earth's distant past.
