According to the study, India contains volcanic and sedimentary rocks dating back 3.5 billion years and has a similar geological history to parts of South Africa and Australia.
Researchers from Wits University in South Africa, the University of Johannesburg (UJ) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences examined volcanic and sedimentary rocks from the Daitari Greenstone Belt in the Singhbhum Craton of eastern India, about 3.5 billion years ago.
Kraton is part of the ancient climate that was formed billions of years ago. His research provides a window into how processes inside and on Earth worked in the past.
The team undertook a complete field survey and precise Uranium-Lead (U-Pb) radiometric dating to assess the geology of the ancient greenstone.
The study, published in the journal Precambrian Research, identifies key geological time scales that reflect the tectonic evolution of the Daitari Greenstones.
Jaganmoy Jodder of Wits University said: “The Daitari greenstone belt has a similar geological makeup and compares favorably with greenstones found in the Barberton and Nondweni regions of South Africa.”
Marine volcanic eruptions are common between 3.5 and 33 billion years ago, and are mainly preserved as pillow lavas in the greenstones of Singhbhum, Kaapwaal and Pilbara cratons.
More importantly, the volcanism style carved out of the silica-rich rocks provides evidence of explosive subsurface weathering of the ocean.
“Silicon volcanism followed by sedimentary rocks containing marine turbidity flows formed by the sinking of volcanic sources,” said Jodder, who led the research.
“This provides an age estimate of about 3.5 billion years ago for marine sedimentary rocks based on zircon U-Pb data from the deposit,” he said.
Detrital zircon geochronology analyzes the age of zircons stored in a specific sedimentary unit.
The study of ancient greenstones not only understand various volcanic processes, but well-preserved greenstones are the preservation of small sedimentary rocks formed in the sea.
“Volcano-sedimentary rocks provide information about the conditions for life on the young Earth and can be seen as a time capsule to better understand the evolutionary story of our planet,” said Jodder.
The team showed that this ancient climate underwent the same geological process 3.5 billion years ago.
“However, we do not know their exact paleo-geographic location. Therefore, we cannot confirm that they once formed part of the supercontinent,” he said.
