Earth's Metal Recipe: Tectonics and the Supercontinent Split

This Is Spacetime Series twenty eight, Episode one hundred and twelve were broadcast on the seventeenth of September twenty twenty five. Coming up on Space Time, ancient rocks revealing how a super continent broke apart, scientists confirm water once flowed on the asteroid Ryugu, and a new study trying to pin down the origins of globular clusters. All that and more coming up on space Time. Welcome to space Time with Stuart Gary. Scientists examining rare minerals found in outback Australia have shown how huge tectonic forces so we are apart the super continent of Rdinia more than eight hundred million years ago. The findings were reported in the journal Geological Magazine, are shedding new light on how rare metal rich magmas reached the planet's surface. The authors show that niobian rich carbonatites rose up from deep within the planet through pre existing full zones during a tectonic rifting event between eight hundred and thirty and eight hundred and twenty million years ago, and that ultimately broke up the super continent Redinia. Carbonatites are rare igneous rocks known to host major global deposits of critical metals such as niobium and rare earth elements. Niobium is a strategic metal vital for producing light, high strength steel used in aircraft construction, as well as pipelines, electric vehicles, and as a key component in some next generation batteries, in superconducting technologies and clean energy production. One of the studies authors, Chris Kirklan from Curtain University, says these carbonatites are unlike anything previously known in the Aileron Province and they contain important concentrations of niobium, but by detecting when and how they formed has historically been difficult due to their complex geological histories. The Aleron Province is located near Alice Springs in the Northern Territory. Kirkland and colleagues used multiple isotobe dating techniques and drill call carbonatite samples that had been in place during a period of continental rifting which preceded the breakup of Rhdinia. By analyzing isotopes and using higher resolution imaging, they were able to reconstruct more than five hundred million years of geological events the rocks had experienced. They found the tectonic setting allowed carbonatite magmas to rise through the fault zones. These fault zones had remained open and active for hundreds of millions of years, delivering metal rich melts from deep within the planet's mantle up into its crust. Kirkland says this approach allowed him and his colleagues to pinpoint where the carbonatites formed and separate those original magnetic events from changes that happened later in the rocks. Rudineas what's known as a super continent. So that's a period of time when all the continental fragments of Earth were really all joined together and stop together. So you can think, you know, at the minute, we've got Africa and America. You can see, you know, the outline of those continents kind of looked like they're pretty similar. So if we rule back time, those continental fragments would have come together. So Rodinia is a super continent about one billion years ago. So one billion years ago we had the super continent, this aggregation of all these fragments of crust on our planet, and it's quite important geologically. And as continental drift happened, tectonics took over and Redinea split apart about eight hundred and thirty eight hundred and twenty million years ago and there's some interesting evidence of that. Yeah, that's exactly right. So three time, you know, super continents come together and then they break up. But when they break up, interesting things happen with the rocks. You know, we get more manful material rising through the crassons that ass and it brings with it metals and that's kind of important for us going exploring to look for certain resources. So specific types of rocks. One specific type of rocks known as a carbonotype because it's a carbonet magma typically is associated with breakup. So Rodinia was breaking up about eight hundred and thirty million years ago and that breakup event brought metals up from the mantle. And that's a pretty interesting process because it helps us go and explore for rocks and metals. So we looked at these carbonotypes, the rocks from right at the center of Australia. But they've previously been looked at, but they're actually really challenging to understand their age. But using a range of different minerals and isotopic technique, we managed to get an age out of them at eight hundred and thirty million years, and as we said, that's an important time in Earth history because it tells us about the breakup of Rudinia. And that's interesting because at that time we also note that there's nilobium bearing rocks. So these carbonotypes are bringing metals with them, and those metals, we think are being formed at the same time, so they're being brought out of the mantle and placed into the crust. And that that's useful knife because we've got a recipe, if you like, for a mineral system, so it helps us to go and explore for these other niobium bearing rocks, which is an important metal for you know, high strength schemes advanced down in green technology like that electric vehicle batteries and wind turbines for example, they all the lion niobium. So having this recipe for this metal is kind of important to help us find more of it. Do we know how the metals may deep underground? Most metals sink, right, you know, we've got a magnum that creates a process where you've got fractionate material, so white material will rise up and heavy material will sink die, so the mantle becomes more concentrated in metals than one of them is niobium. So when you have rifting events and that's when magmas are rising up from the mantil, it actually provides a mechanism for transferring some of these concentrated metals deep in our planets upwards into the crust where we can access them. And what specifically interesting is these urbonotype melt are very reactive. They're chemically strange rocks, so they react quite strongly. They dissolve crystals, but then they re precipitate them or redrow them again and in that process they drop out the metal into a range of different minerals, including one that's named a pyrochlore, and that's part of the process that enriches the rocks in metal. The entire Western Australian region is an absolute playground or new metals and unique geology, isn't it. Yeah, that's exactly right. I think there's a number of different reasons for that. So one is that through time, you know, you get different types of metal deposits forming, So gold, for example, tends to be concentrated in really old blocks of crust, and then you might get events that circulate water and fluid through those rocks when they tend to enrich things like gold. But then we have other mineral systems which are formed in a different way. For example, when we're getting mantle upwelling events like we've just been talking about it, like rifting, and those sorts of events would happen away from the older blocks. They can to occur in slightly younger rocks. I play slightly younger, right, We're talking about a process eight hundred and thirty million years ago. That's actually quite young for West Australia, where we've got these really truly ancient it is across most of the yields aren't. For example, is about two point six billion years old. That's much much older. But it's about having this huge amount of time and this ability for and then fluids to interact with each other that allows us to have these enrichment events creating all these metals that we need for our society at different points in time. We see this on the surface in the jagged remains of these giant cratons. Yeah, we do, We absolutely do. So you can find lots of interesting rocks on the surface. But of course, when you want to fight a mind, you need to look at things in three dimensions. So that's when you start to think about drill core and exploring for rocks deeper under the cover, and that's where we use drill core, and we look at those drill courts to understand the size and the volumes of rocks that are carrying these metals. So it's not just about the exposed rock, it's about predicting in if you like three dimensions where these volumes of rock occur. The size of these features is incredible. Yeah, that's exactly right. Yeah, there's these fantastic geophysical maps that alliaus to kind of image through the subsurface, and there's geological structures that run all the way through our continent. It's quite remarkable. There's even one actually very close to where you're talking about that runs almost north Spout and it looks as if it's a massive, big crack through our entire confidence and the reality of that is, well, it kind of was. You know, we have these big structures that are where the crack arms broke apart and came back together again, and those cracks are the exact places we have fluid. When geologists talk about fluids, they mean magmas, but they also need water circulation as well. But they mean silica rock circulation, so magmas and they were pumping up along these long lived deep fracture systems. These fracture systems can be so huge they tap all the way to the mantle. So they're not just surface features. These are deep features that really tell us about heart planet was put together, and they're the exact places we might get metals enrich so planet it's very important for carrying out exploration. That's Professor Chris Kirkland from Curtain University. And this is space time. Still the CAM siders confirmed that water once flowed across the asteroid Ryegu, and we look at the possible origins of popular clusters. All that and more still to come on space time, scientists have shown that liquid water once flowed on the parent body which spawned the nearest astroid Ryuga, more than a billion years after it first formed. The findings, reported in the journal Nature, could impact current models of planetary formation, including those describing the birth of the Earth, and the study also overturned some long held assumptions that water activity on asteroids only occur during the earliest moments of the Solar System's history. And your results are based on tiny rock fragments of asteroid returned by the Japanese Aerospace Exploration agencies hya BUSA two spacecraft, which visited Ryugo on a sample return mission back in twenty eighteen. The studies lead author so Yoshi Izuka from the University of Tokyo. Astronomers already have a relatively good understanding of how our solar system formed, but there are still gaps, including knowledge of how the Earth can to possessed so much water. Now, it's long been hypothesized the carbonaceous asteroids like Ryugu, which formed from ISOs and dust in the art of solar system, could be one potential source of Earth's water. A zuclin colleagues found that Rayugu preserved a pristine record of water activity, evidence that fluids were moving through its rocks far later than expected, and this changes how astronomers think about the long term fate of water in asteroids. The heart of the discovery comes from an analysis of isotopes of lutetium and hafnium. Is radioactive decay from the tetium one seventy six into hafnium one seventy six can serve as a sort of clock for measuring geological processes. Their presence in specific quantities in the sample studied were expected to relate to the age of the asteroid in a fairly predictable way, but the ratio of the tetium one seventy six to happenium one seventy six was farhigher than expected, and this strongly implied that some sort of fluid, probably water, was essentially washing out the the tetium from the rocks containing it. Now the most likely trigger for all of this was an impact on the larger parent asteroid of Ryugu, which fractured the rock, generating heat and melting the buried ice. This allowed the liquid water to percolate through the body, and the same impact may well have been responsible for creating Rayugu out of its parent asteroid in the first place. One of the most important implications for all this is that carbon riche asteroids may have contained and delivered much more of Earth's water previously thought. It seems Roheugue's parent body retained ice for more than a billion years, meaning similar bodies striking a young Earth they will have carried an estimated two to three times more water than what standard models currently account for, significantly affecting Earth's early oceans and atmosphere. It suggests that the building blocks of Earth were far wetter than previously imagined, and it forced the scientists to rethink this starting conditions for Earth's water system and how and when our planet first became habitable. This is space time still to come. We look at the possible origins of those mysterious objects called globular clusters, and later in the Science report and you study finds that the more psychiatric disorders you have in later life, the more likely you are to develop dementia. All that and more still to come on space time. For centuries, astronomers have puzzled over the origins of some of the universe's oldest and dens estellar systems, known as globular clusters, and now they may finally have an answer. Globular clusters are stellar spheres containing thousands to millions of densely packed, gravitationally bound stars. The stars in globular clusters all have a similar chemical composition that suggests they were all originally born at the same time in the same stellar nursery of molecular gas and dust clouds. Most galaxies have large collections of globular clusters, orbiting them. Our own galaxy, the Milky Way, has at least one hundred and fifty, and a neighboring big galaxy, Andromeda, has more than two hundred. But that also opens the possibility that at least some globular clusters I in fact the stellar cause of satellite dwarf galaxies, which were stripped of their outer stars during mergers with host galaxies in a process called galactic cannibalism. Now a report in the journal Nature may finally have solved the mystery, suggesting both options are possible. The new detailed computer simulations also uncovered a new class of stellar objects which may already be in our galaxy, globular cluster. Like dwarves. Now, unlike galaxies, globular clusters show no evidence of dark matter, and their stars are unusually uniform in age and chemical composition traits, which have left scientists debating their formation since their discovery back in the seventeenth century. The new ultra high resolution computer simulations, known as EDGE, can trace the universe's thirteen point eight billion year history in unprecedented detail, and that allows scientists to watch globular clusters form in virtual real time in a virtual cosmos, and the simulations found muliple pathways for the creation of globular clusters and unexpectedly the emergence of a new class of star system globular cluster like dwarves stellar constellations that, in terms of their properties, sits somewhere between globular clusters and dwarf galaxies. The studies lead author Ethan Taylor from the University of Surrey says the formation of globular custers has been a mystery for hundreds of years, so Tenlor and colleagues use the UK's direct National Supercomputer Facility to run the edge simulations over several years. Conventional dwarf galaxies are typically dominated by dark matter, with around a thousand times more of this mysterious substance than stars and gas combined. However, the newly identified globebular cluster like dwarves appear similar to regular star clusters when observed, yet still contain a significant amount of dark matter. That means that telescopes may already have found them in the real universe but classified them as regular globular clusters, and this small difference places them in a unique position to study both dark matter and globular cluster formation, and several known Milky wayt satellite galaxies, such as the ultra faint dwarf galaxy Reticulum two, are likely candidates. If confirmed, they could become prime sites in the search for pristine metal free stars born in the early universe, as well as new locations to test models for the ever ellusive dark matter. At a resolution of ten light years fine enough to capture the effects of individual supernovae, the authors were able to show that globular clusters can form in at least two different ways, both without dark matter. The next step is to confirm the existence of these globular cluster like dwarves through targeted observations with telescopes including the web Space Telescope and upcoming deep spectroscopic surveys. If they do, it could give astronomers new ways to test dark matter theories and offer some of the best chances yet to find the universe's very first generation of metal free stars this space Time and time. That'll take another brief look at some of the other stories making news in science this week with the Science Report. A new study has found that the more co occurring psychiatric disorders you have in older age, the more likely you are to develop dementia. The findings, reported in the British Medical Journal, compared dementia diagnosis among patients aged forty five and over based on how many psychiatric diagnoses they had, compared to patients with a single disorder. The authors said the odds of developing dementia were more than doubled for those with two disorders and eleven times high for those with four or more. They say it's possible that the presence of modible psychiatric disorders could be in early sight of dementia rather than a cause of the condition. Boeing and the Australian Air Force have completed the maiden test flight trials of the new MQ twenty eight Ghost Spat a manned stealth fighter, four months ahead of schedule. The multi roll aircraft are designed as a force multiplier, working with the F thirty five Lightning two stealth fighters and the FA eighteen Super Hornet Fighters, as well as E seven, a Wedgetail airborne early warning control aircraft. The test flights were run out of the Woma A Rocket Range in out back South Australia and from the Tindall Air Force Space in the northern territory. The validation flights tested the unmanned combat aerial vehicles in realistic battle scenarios, including autonomous missions and their ability to operate effectively alongside manned aircraft. They are also deployed in coordinator operations with modible ghost Bats. The MQ twenty eight also demonstration to advanced data sharing capabilities between crude and uncruded platforms, enhancing situational awareness. Each aircraft can carry two internally mounted AIM one twenty advanced medium Range airware missiles and are equipped with a range of sensors including infrared search and track systems and air away refueling capabilities also being looked at in order to extend their range from the current three thy seven hundred kilometers as well as the Austraan Air Force. The Ghostbats also being looked at by the Pentagon of possible deployment with F fifty Ex Eagle two fighters as additional sensor nodes help find and target hostile air offense systems. Scientists are found that there are no plant based food for dogs sold in the United Kingdom which meet the nutritional guidelines for Man's Best Friend's health. They say, if you've got your dog on a plant based diet, you need to add supplements in order to fill the gaps. A report in the General Plus one analyzed the nutrient content of thirty one dry dog foods that were labeled as complete, which included nineteen meat based foods, six plant based diets, and six veterinary foods designed to be low in protein for dogs with kidney issues. The authors found that the meat and plant based foods had similar nutritional profiles when it came to proteins and amino acids, but the plant based foods typically didn't meet the guidelines for iodine and vitamin B levels, which adult dogs need. It's important to also note that none of the foods they tested completely met the standards for all nutrients needed by adult dogs, but in many instances these missing nutrients can be added in supplements or from changes to formulation by the pet food manufacturers if they're willing to put the animal's nutrition above profits. Apple have just released their new thinner, tougher and high capacity iPhone seventeen, but there's still no folk version, and AI remains an issue with the details which joined by Technology editor Alex Aharovroyt from Tech Advice Start Life. Well, we've seen in recent times Samsung launchest new phones, Google launches new phone and they've both tried very hard to gazump Apple by launching technologies that should be better than what Apple is launching. But Apple is now launched, and we've seen new iPhones, new watches, new headphones, and new capabilities. Now let's start with the iPhone seventeen Air, which I just called. The iPhone Air is five point six millimeters thin, which is point two of a millimeter thinner than Samsung's S twenty five Edge. And look, although iPhone and Apple users are going to say that the iPhone Air is better, Samsung really did come out with it a couple of months ago or three or four months ago, and they have two cameras on the back of just one, there's this five point eight millimeters so a little bit thicker, but no one's going to really notice that much of a different. It is supposed to be the most durable phone that Apple has made, and all day battery life even though it's got clearly a smaller battery inside. And I noticed that when they launched the all day battery life claim. In the next scene, they said, up and we have a maxif battery that connects to the back which is thinner and boosts your video to forty hours. So clearly it's going to have less battery life. But if you like me and already carrying around a spare battery for your iPhone sixteen Promax that has it much bigger battery, well nothing's going to change. I'm going to still have to carry around a battery. The iPhone seventeen and seventeen Pro and Promax obviously improvements with cameras and processes and ceramic glass all very impressive. I think one of the cool things with the Promax is that now comes in a two terabyte configuration in Australia. That's going to take you to three thy, seven hundred and ninety nine dollars, So you're paying a lot of money for that extra space. Want of space, Let's be honest, Well, your photos are building up, your music's building up. You need the extra capacity. Well, as we all know, space is the final frontier and most people buy a smaller iPhone and they regret it. Now we also have the new watches. The se Watch, the cheapest one is now always on for the first time. The series eleven is thinner than before, and the Ultra three has got a slightly bigger screen in the same size case. The last two have five G not just four G, and the last two can also do hypertension detection. That's not blood pressure monitoring in the sense that you have a cuff that blows up like you have with the Quawai blood pressure watch, but over the course of time it can detect whether you have hypertension or not if you switch that feature of And the Ultra three can now do emergency SOS. So it's the ultimate watch for somebody who goes out on adventures and they have a smartphone that their watch can have longer battery life. In fact, it's now forty two hours instead of thirty six hours for the Ultra three, and it can also do messages via satellite and find my advice satellite. So definitely perfect for adventurers. Is it far from being an eperb that's sort of what they're aiming at. I guess it's pretty close. I mean an ey purp will have longer battery life and probably stronger connection to satellite, But a lot of people if they have an Apple Ultra three smart watch, I mean, yeah, it's effectively an EPERB and the extra battery life means that can be out in the while for that much longer. Similarly, the Series eleven is the first Apple Watch to go from eighteen hours to twenty four hours of battery life, and that will be extended if you go into power saving mode. So the watches are an improvement, the phones are an improvement. And then we have the headset. Now, the Apple Airpod's pro Version three, got a sleeker case, it's got a better fit for your ears, measured over one hundred thousand years. We've got five different sizes of silicon tips to make sure it fits any year. There's memory foam inside to do more noise isolation. We're talking about eight hours of battery life, which is an improvement. I remember originally when it was something like three hours. And if you're using it in hearing aid mode, you know I get ten hours. Apple has increased the longevity of its devices by offering OS updates for years, and it's best if you've got an old device that's several years old. That's going to be the biggest upgrade for people with older devices. Of course, the elephant in the room for Apple remains AI. Doesn't it it does, And look, Apples did make references to the fact that does use forms of AI and machine learning and has done for many years, but there was no mention of a Siri chatbot. Then no mention of the deal that Apple was reported to have done with Google to bring the Gemini, a customized version of Gemini to give Siri. There's conversational capabilities that we take for granted with Gemini and Android devices and with CHATGBT. And also Apple was meant to have a magic Q style system that Google has promoted earlier this year, where it could bring up relevant information about bookings you've made, people you've spoken to, other information that it's collected and harvested from different apps on your phone. Nothing from Apple on that promised to come in the future, but they dubiously avoided mentioning anything about that. So look, Google and Samsung will say that they have done enough to fight back against these updates from Apple. They have a stronger AI strategy. They also have improved cameras and you know, slimmer devices. They've got the fold. Yeah, both of them have folds, but next year Apple's meant to bring the fold, and next year will be the year that Apple and Samsung and probably Google will have a fold that has no priest whatsoever. That's Alex ohrrov Royd from Take Advice, Start Live, and that's the show for now. Space Time is available every Monday, Wednesday and Friday through Apple Podcasts, iTunes, Stitcher, Google podcast, pocker Casts, Spotify, Acast, Amazon Music, Bytes dot com, SoundCloud, YouTube, your favorite podcast download provider, and from space Time with Stuart Gary dot com. Space Time's also broadcast through the National Science Foundation, on Science Own Radio and on both iHeartRadio and tune In Radio. And you can help to support our show by visiting the Spacetime Store for a range of promotional merchandising goodies, or by becoming a Spacetime Patron, which gives you access to triple episode commercial free versions of the show, as well as lots of burnus audio content which doesn't go to weir, access to our exclusive Facebook group, and other rewards. Just go to space Time with Stewart Gary dot com for full details. You've been listening to Spacetime with Stuart Gary. This has been another quality podcast production from Bytes dot com.