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    Class Prep 11 Historical Geology

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    katie.robinhood
    The early atmosphere was formed through outgassing and consisted of gases like hydrogen, carbon dioxide and methane. Two potential sources of atmospheric oxygen were photolysis of water vapor and ultraviolet rays breaking apart water molecules. Banded iron formations and the first appearance of redbeds indicate that oxygen began accumulating in the atmosphere significantly around 2.2 billion years ago.

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    Class Prep 11 Historical Geology

    Uploaded by

    katie.robinhood
    8 views2 pages
    The early atmosphere was formed through outgassing and consisted of gases like hydrogen, carbon dioxide and methane. Two potential sources of atmospheric oxygen were photolysis of water vapor and ultraviolet rays breaking apart water molecules. Banded iron formations and the first appearance of redbeds indicate that oxygen began accumulating in the atmosphere significantly around 2.2 billion years ago.

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    The early atmosphere was formed through outgassing and consisted of gases like hydrogen, carbon dioxide and methane. Two potential sources of atmospheric oxygen were photolysis of water vapor and ultraviolet rays breaking apart water molecules. Banded iron formations and the first appearance of redbeds indicate that oxygen began accumulating in the atmosphere significantly around 2.2 billion years ago.

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    8 views2 pages

    Class Prep 11 Historical Geology

    Uploaded by

    katie.robinhood
    The early atmosphere was formed through outgassing and consisted of gases like hydrogen, carbon dioxide and methane. Two potential sources of atmospheric oxygen were photolysis of water vapor and ultraviolet rays breaking apart water molecules. Banded iron formations and the first appearance of redbeds indicate that oxygen began accumulating in the atmosphere significantly around 2.2 billion years ago.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    Class Prep 11: Atmospheric Function and Early Evolution

    Katie Robinson

    1. Please examine Figures 3.16 and 3.17 (p. 68), and to the best
    of your ability, explain why patterns of atmospheric
    circulation occur as indicated in those illustrations.

    Figure 3.16 to me is showing the arrows as warm and cold air, within
    the atmosphere which is depicted as a bubble around the Earth. There
    are small cycles of where the warm air rises into the atmosphere and
    as it cools it cycles down, but towards Earth in a kind of convection
    cell.

    2. How did earth’s early atmosphere form, and how is it different


    from earth’s current atmosphere? What is the composition of
    earth’s atmosphere today?

    The early atmosphere was formed through outgassing from the earths
    settling/cooling magmatic ocean, and in the gases, there was water
    vapor making a thicker air that clung gravitationally to the earth. The
    composition of the early atmosphere was composed of H2), Carbon
    Dioxide, Nitrogen, and Methane, while the atmosphere today is
    composed of Oxygen, Nitrogen, and Carbon Dioxide.

    3. Please provide two possible sources for atmospheric oxygen


    in earth’s early atmosphere.

    One of the ways that atmospheric oxygen could have been introduced
    into the atmosphere is photolysis as the water degassing from
    volcanoes, and the second being that the suns ultra-violet rays would
    break apart the water vapor molecules and make hydrogen and oxygen
    break apart in the atmosphere.

    4. What are Banded Iron Formations (BIFs)? When were they


    most common in the rock record? How might the formation of
    BIFs be related to the accumulation of atmospheric oxygen?

    The banded iron formations are alternating thin iron and chert layers,
    and prominent during the Proterozoic. BIFS might be related to the
    accumulation of atmospheric oxygen because the liquid state Iron was
    in when there wasn’t any Oxygen in the atmosphere.
    5. When do the first Terrestrial Redbeds appear? What is their
    significance with respect to the evolution of atmospheric
    oxygen?

    They first appeared during the Proterozoic about 2.4 billion years ago,
    and it’s significant because Iron does not oxidize without the presence
    of oxygen.

    6. According to evidence from BIFs, terrestrial redbeds, detrital


    uraninite and pyrite, approximately when did oxygen begin to
    become a significant part of earth’s atmosphere?

    Approximately 2.2 years ago.

    7. What is ozone? When did the ozone layer begin to form, and
    why is it important?

    The Ozone is what we get from oxygen when ultraviolet radiation


    splits diatomic oxygen into atomic oxygen, and it began to form
    around 1.8 billion years ago. It’s important because it protects us from
    the radiation coming from the sun or space.

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