The Early Earth (eBook)

James Badro is a Professor and Research Director at the Institute of Earth Physics in France. He is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union and a Life Fellow of the Mineralogical Society of America. His research interests involve deep earth geophysics and geochemistry through high pressure experiments, with special focus on experimental petrology, experimental geochemistry, mineral physics mantle and core composition, structure and dynamics, earth formation and evolution, earth accretion and differentiation. He is a well-known author with numerous research publications including in Science, Nature Materials and Geophysical Monograph Series. Michael J. Walter is the Professor and Head of School of Earth Sciences at the University of Bristol, UK. His research interests involve high pressure-temperature experimental petrology, geochemistry, and mineral physics with special focus on topics including the differentiation of the mantle and core, Earth accretion, subsolidus lower-mantle phase relations and crystal chemistry, origin and evolution of deep-seated carbonatite magmas and mineral inclusions in diamond. He is a well-known author with numerous publications including in Science and Journal of Geophysical Research.

Contributors

Preface

Acknowledgements

1. Timing of nebula processes which shaped the precursors of the terrestrial planets

Marc Chaussidon and Ming-Chang Liu

2. The Earth's building blocks

Frédéric Moynier and Bruce Fegley, Jr.

3. Earth and Terrestrial Planet Formation

Seth A. Jacobson, Kevin J. Walsh

4. Late Accretion and the Late Veneer

Alessandro Morbidelli and Bernard J. Wood

5. Early differentiation and core formation: processes and timescales

Francis Nimmo and Thorsten Kleine

6. An experimental geochemistry perspective on Earth's core formation

Julien Siebert and Anat Shahar

7. Thermal state and evolution of the Earth core and deep mantle

Stéphane Labrosse, John W. Hernlund, and Kei Hirose

8. Early Differentiation and its Long Term Consequences for Earth Evolution

Richard W. Carlson, Maud Boyet, Jonathan O'Neil, Hanika Rizo and Richard J. Walker

Index

"This book reviews our current understanding of the fundamental processes, which took a cloud of gas and dust in the solar nebula to the highly differentiated worl we know in a relatively short period of time (probably less than 100 million years, or about 2% of the age of the solar system)."

"The papers follow a standard scientific research style - clear, but terse and to the point with frequent use of acronyms, and an expectation of considerable subject matter knowledge from the reader."

William R. Green (05/09/2016)