The Archean Earth
- 2nd Edition - October 1, 2025
- Imprint: Elsevier Science
- Editors: Martin Homann, Timothy W. Lyons, Richard E. Ernst, Christoph Heubeck, Eva Stueeken, Alex Webb, Dominic Papineau, Rajat Mazumder, Paul RD Mason, Wladyslaw Altermann
- Language: English
- Paperback ISBN:9 7 8 - 0 - 3 2 3 - 9 5 5 4 7 - 8
- eBook ISBN:9 7 8 - 0 - 3 2 3 - 9 5 5 4 8 - 5
The Archean Earth: Tempos and Events, Second Edition is a process-based reference book that focuses on the most important events in early Earth, bringing together experts across Ea… Read more
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The Archean Earth: Tempos and Events, Second Edition is a process-based reference book that focuses on the most important events in early Earth, bringing together experts across Earth Sciences to give a comprehensive overview of the main events of the Archean Eon, as well as of the rates at which important geological and geobiological processes occurred in the same time interval. Over the last two decades, significant progress has been made in our understanding of the processes and events on the early Earth corresponding to advances in the analytical technologies and the continuing efforts of many colleagues that pursue their passion of unravelling the Archean rock record.
The book addresses the origin of the Earth, succeeding impact events, and the evolution of the early Earth, covering topics such as Archean tectonics, volcanism, generation of continental crust, and the ongoing debate about the onset of plate tectonics; the evolution and models for Earth's hydrosphere and atmosphere; the Archean atmosphere and chemical sedimentation; and sedimentation through Archean time; among others. Each topic is well-illustrated and includes a closing commentary at the end of each chapter, leading up to the final chapter which blends the major geological events and rates at which important processes occurred into a synthesis, postulating a number of "event clusters" in the Archean when significant changes occurred in many natural systems and geological environments
- Provides a comprehensive introduction and overview on early Earth, highlighting the Archean Eon in the context of the larger time scales
- Presents detailed descriptions of the main processes, events, and rates that occurred throughout the Archean
- Offers an assessment of the first habitable environments, the preserved morphological and geochemical traces of early life, and the impact it had on Earth's biogeochemical cycles
Academics, graduate students and researchers focusing on Earth history, Geobiology, Astrobiology, and all aspects of the Earth Science including tectonic and atmospheric evolution, environmental ecosystems, as well as Earth's biogeochemical cycles.Industrial experts (e.g. at mining companies), geography and Earth sciences lecturers.
Chapter 1. FORMATION OF A HABITABLE PLANET
1.1. Introduction
1.2. Earth's Formation and First Billion Years
1.3. Setting the stage: Building and maintaining a habitable world and the early conditions that could favor life’s beginnings on Earth and beyond
1.4. Early Impacts: Processes and the Terrestrial Record
1.5 Our Solar System Neighborhood: Three Diverging Tales of Planetary Habitability and Windows to Earth’s Past and Future
1.6. What the Zircon Record Reveals About the Habitability of the Hadean Earth
Chapter 2. EVOLUTION OF EARTH’S INTERIOR
2.1. Introduction
2.2. Archean Mantle Heat Transport and Thermal Evolution
2.3. Generation and Preservation of Archean Lithosphere and Crust
2.4. Mantle Differentiation, Mixing and Interior-Exterior Exchange
Chapter 3. ARCHEAN MAGMATISM, TECTONICS AND CONTINENTAL CRUST
3.1. Introduction
3.2. Archean to Mesozoic-Cenozoic Seismic Crustal Structure: Implications for Geological and
Biological Evolution
3.3. Archean Greenstones and Evolving Tectonic Regimes on Earth
3.4. Towards quantification of the style of Archean plate tectonics from paleo-plate boundary features
3.5. Archean Greenstone Belts: Records of Pre-/Non-Plate Tectonics
3.6. Komatiites: their geochemistry and origins
3.7 Record of Archean and earliest Proterozoic Large Igneous Provinces (LIPs) and their mafic dyke swarms
3.8. The PalaeoPlates compilation of Earth’s crustal blocks: Implications for continental growth, recycling, and preservation, and for global paleogeographic reconstructions in Archean and Proterozoic time
3.9. Additional aspects on the Archean magmatic and tectonic record
Chapter 4. ATMOSPHERIC EVOLUTION AND BIOGEOCHEMICAL CYCLES
4.1. Introduction
4.2. Oxygenating Earth
4.3. Evolution of the Archean Atmosphere
4.4. Iron formations: Unique archives to reconstruct the Precambrian Earth
4.5. Ephemeral subaerial environments, paleosols, and life on land: consequences for early continental weathering and global biogeochemistry
4.6 Evolving weathering processes during the Archean Eon
4.7. Evolution of Earth's Biogeochemical Cycles
4.7.1. Metal sources and sinks
4.7.2. Biogeochemical nitrogen cycling on the Archean Earth
4.7.3. Phosphorus bioabailability
4.7.4 Archean Methane Cycling and Life's Co-Evolution: Intertwining Early Biogeochemical Processes and Ancient Microbial Metabolism
Chapter 5. EVOLUTION OF LIFE AND ARCHEAN GEOBIOLOGY
5.1. Introduction, Archean cherts?
5.2. Biosignatures and tests of biogenicity in the early rock record
5.3. Origins of Archean organic matter
5.4. Microbial Mats in the Siliciclastic Rock Record
5.5. Occurrence and Biogenicity of Archean Stromatolites and Microbial Mats
5.6. The Archean microfossil record
5.7. Evidence of Earth's Early Biosphere
5.7.1. Critical evaluation of the age and biosignatures of Earth’s oldest purported fossils from the Nuvvuagittuq Supracrustal Belt
5.7.2. Seeking Eoarchean Life Signatures in the Isua Supracrustal Belt and the Akilia Association (Greenland)
5.7.3. Evidence of Earth’s Early Biosphere from the Pilbara region, Western Australia.
5.7.4. South Africa’s Paleoarchean record of early life
5.7.5. The Archaean record of the Singhbhum Craton – a new window into early life on Earth
5.8. Archean Carbonate Platforms
5.9. Evolving Life and secular changes in the Archean Sedimentation Patterns
Chapter 6. SEDIMENTATION THROUGH ARCHEAN TIME
6.1. Introduction
6.2. Archean Tides and Tidalites: Recognition and Significance
6.3. Archean alluvial, fluvial, lacustrine and glacial deposits: An overview
6.4. Archean Eolian Dynamics, Deposits, and Indicators of Other Weather Phenomena: Lessons from Earth and Mars
6.5. Sedimentary basins of (Paleo-)Archean greenstone belts
6.6. Comparing the Archean stratigraphic sequences of India and South Africa
6.7. Visualizing the Archean through AI
1.1. Introduction
1.2. Earth's Formation and First Billion Years
1.3. Setting the stage: Building and maintaining a habitable world and the early conditions that could favor life’s beginnings on Earth and beyond
1.4. Early Impacts: Processes and the Terrestrial Record
1.5 Our Solar System Neighborhood: Three Diverging Tales of Planetary Habitability and Windows to Earth’s Past and Future
1.6. What the Zircon Record Reveals About the Habitability of the Hadean Earth
Chapter 2. EVOLUTION OF EARTH’S INTERIOR
2.1. Introduction
2.2. Archean Mantle Heat Transport and Thermal Evolution
2.3. Generation and Preservation of Archean Lithosphere and Crust
2.4. Mantle Differentiation, Mixing and Interior-Exterior Exchange
Chapter 3. ARCHEAN MAGMATISM, TECTONICS AND CONTINENTAL CRUST
3.1. Introduction
3.2. Archean to Mesozoic-Cenozoic Seismic Crustal Structure: Implications for Geological and
Biological Evolution
3.3. Archean Greenstones and Evolving Tectonic Regimes on Earth
3.4. Towards quantification of the style of Archean plate tectonics from paleo-plate boundary features
3.5. Archean Greenstone Belts: Records of Pre-/Non-Plate Tectonics
3.6. Komatiites: their geochemistry and origins
3.7 Record of Archean and earliest Proterozoic Large Igneous Provinces (LIPs) and their mafic dyke swarms
3.8. The PalaeoPlates compilation of Earth’s crustal blocks: Implications for continental growth, recycling, and preservation, and for global paleogeographic reconstructions in Archean and Proterozoic time
3.9. Additional aspects on the Archean magmatic and tectonic record
Chapter 4. ATMOSPHERIC EVOLUTION AND BIOGEOCHEMICAL CYCLES
4.1. Introduction
4.2. Oxygenating Earth
4.3. Evolution of the Archean Atmosphere
4.4. Iron formations: Unique archives to reconstruct the Precambrian Earth
4.5. Ephemeral subaerial environments, paleosols, and life on land: consequences for early continental weathering and global biogeochemistry
4.6 Evolving weathering processes during the Archean Eon
4.7. Evolution of Earth's Biogeochemical Cycles
4.7.1. Metal sources and sinks
4.7.2. Biogeochemical nitrogen cycling on the Archean Earth
4.7.3. Phosphorus bioabailability
4.7.4 Archean Methane Cycling and Life's Co-Evolution: Intertwining Early Biogeochemical Processes and Ancient Microbial Metabolism
Chapter 5. EVOLUTION OF LIFE AND ARCHEAN GEOBIOLOGY
5.1. Introduction, Archean cherts?
5.2. Biosignatures and tests of biogenicity in the early rock record
5.3. Origins of Archean organic matter
5.4. Microbial Mats in the Siliciclastic Rock Record
5.5. Occurrence and Biogenicity of Archean Stromatolites and Microbial Mats
5.6. The Archean microfossil record
5.7. Evidence of Earth's Early Biosphere
5.7.1. Critical evaluation of the age and biosignatures of Earth’s oldest purported fossils from the Nuvvuagittuq Supracrustal Belt
5.7.2. Seeking Eoarchean Life Signatures in the Isua Supracrustal Belt and the Akilia Association (Greenland)
5.7.3. Evidence of Earth’s Early Biosphere from the Pilbara region, Western Australia.
5.7.4. South Africa’s Paleoarchean record of early life
5.7.5. The Archaean record of the Singhbhum Craton – a new window into early life on Earth
5.8. Archean Carbonate Platforms
5.9. Evolving Life and secular changes in the Archean Sedimentation Patterns
Chapter 6. SEDIMENTATION THROUGH ARCHEAN TIME
6.1. Introduction
6.2. Archean Tides and Tidalites: Recognition and Significance
6.3. Archean alluvial, fluvial, lacustrine and glacial deposits: An overview
6.4. Archean Eolian Dynamics, Deposits, and Indicators of Other Weather Phenomena: Lessons from Earth and Mars
6.5. Sedimentary basins of (Paleo-)Archean greenstone belts
6.6. Comparing the Archean stratigraphic sequences of India and South Africa
6.7. Visualizing the Archean through AI
- Edition: 2
- Published: October 1, 2025
- Imprint: Elsevier Science
- Language: English
MH
Martin Homann
Dr. Homann obtained a MSc in Geology at Potsdam University, Germany, in 2010 and a PhD in Sedimentology and Geobiology from the Free University Berlin, Germany, in 2016. After three years of postdoctoral research at the University of Western Brittany, France, he is now a lecturer in Sedimentology at the University College London. His research is focused on the Archean biosphere, the environments in which microbial life was thriving and the morphological and geochemical traces it left behind in the sedimentary rock record.
Affiliations and expertise
University College London, UKTL
Timothy W. Lyons
Prof. Lyons is a Distinguished Professor of Biogeochemistry in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of California-Riverside, and Director of the UCR Alternative Earths Astrobiology Center. Lyons currently leads the ‘Alternative Earths’ team of the NASA Astrobiology Institute and within NASA’s Interdisciplinary Consortia for Astrobiology Research. He is also a co-leader of NASA’s Prebiotic Chemistry and Early Earth Environments Research Coordination Network. He is a fellow of the Geological Society of America, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Geochemical Society, the European Association of Geochemistry, and the American Geophysical Union. He has been honored with visiting professorships throughout the world. He holds a B.S. from the Colorado School of Mines, an M.S. from the University of Arizona, and a Ph.D. from Yale University. His primary research interests include astrobiology, geobiology, Earth history, and the search for life beyond our solar system.
Affiliations and expertise
University of California, USARE
Richard E. Ernst
Dr Richard Ernst is Scientist in Residence at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. His career has been focussed on Large Igneous Provinces (LIPs) with nearly 300 refereed publications on all aspects of LIPs: including their dramatic flood basalts, ‘plumbing system’ of mafic/ultramafic dykes, sills and layered intrusions, and association with carbonatites, kimberlites and silicic magmatism; links to supercontinent breakup, catastrophic environmental/climate change including mass extinction events, mineral, metal and hydrocarbon resource exploration, and planetary analogues; and characterizing the role of mantle plumes in their origin. He is the author of “Large Igneous Provinces”, Cambridge University Press (2014), a leader of the LIPs Commission of IAVCEI (since 2003), leader of the LIPs and Resource Exploration Program (“LIPs Industry Consortium”, since 2010), leader of the International Venus Research Group (IVRG) (since 2021). He received the 2022 Career Achievement Award of the Volcanology and Igneous Petrology Division (VIP) of the Geological Association of Canada, and was elected a Fellow of the Geological Society of America (2024).
CH
Christoph Heubeck
Prof. Heubeck is a regional "soft-rock" geologist. Originally from Germany, he completed an MSc at the University of Texas at Austin on Tertiary basins on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, followed by a PhD from Stanford University on the Barberton Greenstone Belt of South Africa and Eswatini. He worked for six years as an explorationist and development geologist for Amoco and BP in the US and Canada before joining the Free University Berlin as a faculty member. There, he conducted studies on the Ediacaran-Cambrian boundary in Kazakhstan and China and on Andean Tertiary basins in South America before taking up his interest in the Barberton Greenstone Belt again. In 2014, he moved to the FSU Jena where he holds the chair of General and Historical Geology. Most of his studies are field-based, range from the grain- to the basin-scale, and use - in collaboration with experts - whatever methods are necessary to address the problem at hand.
Affiliations and expertise
Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, GermanyES
Eva Stueeken
Dr. Stüeken obtained a BSc in Geosciences & Astrophysics at Jacobs University, Germany, in 2007 and a PhD in Earth Science and Astrobiology from the University of Washington, Seattle, USA, in 2014. She is now a lecturer at the University of St Andrews and the lead PI of the gas-source stable isotope laboratory. Her research focuses on reconstructing paleoenvironments and biogeochemical cycles, using a combination of field work, geochemical analyses, experiments, and modelling.
Affiliations and expertise
University of St Andrews, UKDP
Dominic Papineau
Dr. Papineau has a PhD in Geological Sciences and Astrobiology from the University of Colorado at Boulder (2006) and a B.Sc. in Physics and Biochemistry from McGill University (2001) in Montréal. He has worked as a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Carnegie Institution of Washington (2006-2010) and as an Assistant Professor at Boston College (2010-2013). He is now an Associate Professor of Geochemistry and Astrobiology at the University College London (2013-) and is also a ‘Disciplinary Pioneering talent’ at the China University of Geosciences in Wuhan (2017-). The overarching theme of his research is about the origin and early evolution of life on Earth as an analogue for extra-terrestrial life. Specifically, he uses micro- to atomic scale chemical imaging techniques to study the geobiological record of the Precambrian.
Affiliations and expertise
Dominic Papineau London Centre for Nanotechnology, UKRM
Rajat Mazumder
Dr. Rajat Mazumder received his M.Sc in Applied Geology in 1991 from the University of Allahabad, (India) and his Ph.D from Jadavpur University (India) in 2002. He was a Post-doctoral Fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) at Yokohama National University (2002-2004), Alexander Von Humboldt Foundation (2005-2006) at Munich University, Germany, and was a recipient of JSPS short-term invitation fellowship for experienced researchers in 2008. Dr. Mazumder taught Sedimentary Petrology, Mineralogy and Precambrian Stratigraphy at Asutosh College (University of Calcutta, 1999-2002), Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (2006), and was an Associate Professor of Geology at the Indian Statistical Institute (2006-2013). He was a Research Fellow at the University of New South Wales Australia (2012-2014). Currently, Dr. Mazumder is an Associate Professor at Curtin University Sarawak, Malaysia and teaches Basin Analysis and Petroleum Systems, Tectonics and Dynamic Earth and Metamorphic Petrology. Dr. Mazumder was one of the global co-leaders of UNESCO-IGCP 509 research project (2005-2009) on the Paleoproterozoic Supercontinent and global evolution. He is an advisory editor of the Journal of the Geological Society of London and an Associate Editor of Marine and Petroleum Geology. His research is mostly focused on the earth’s surface processes during its early history.
Affiliations and expertise
Department of Applied Geosciences, German University of Technology in Oman, Muscat, Oman; and School of Natural Sciences and Engineering, National Institute of Advanced Studies, IISc Campus, Bengaluru, IndiaPM
Paul RD Mason
Paul Mason is a geologist and geochemist whose research has focused on environmental conditions on the Archean and Paleoproterozoic Earth and the links to tectonic and magmatic processes. He obtained his PhD at the University of London and is currently professor in Petrology at the University of Utrecht. His work involves fieldwork in Archean and Paleoproterozic greenstone belts and sedimentary basins with a focus on microanalytical techniques for isotopic and trace element analysis of minerals and rocks.
Affiliations and expertise
Utrecht UniversityWA
Wladyslaw Altermann
Professor Wladyslaw Altermann is a regional geologist with expertise in Precambrian sedimentary systems, carbonate rocks, early life evolution, and more recently, CO₂ sequestration in South Africa. Originally from Poland, he earned his MSc and PhD (Dr. rer. nat.) at the Free University of Berlin (West), focusing on Permo-Carboniferous rocks of Thailand and Malaysia. He also worked for the German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (BGR) in Hannover and in Peru.
In 1988, Prof. Altermann moved to South Africa, which became his third home. After a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Stellenbosch, he returned to Germany to join LMU Munich, where he completed his second doctorate (Dr. habil.) in 1998, studying Archean carbonates, stromatolites, BIFs, and the western Kaapvaal Craton's structural geology.
Prof. Altermann held postdoctoral positions at UCLA (USA), CBM–CNRS Orléans (France), and the University of Western Australia (Perth). He later became Associate Professor at LMU Munich, where he served as interim chair for several professorial positions and served as Honorary Professor at Shandong University of Technology (China) from 2003 to 2005. In 2009, he returned permanently to South Africa, joining the University of Pretoria as the Kumba-Exxaro Chair in Geodynamics of Mineral Deposits (mining industry supported Chair) and later becoming Head of the Department of Geology.
Throughout his career, Prof. Altermann has been deeply involved in the scientific community, serving on national committees and editorial boards for international journals and as editor of books and special volumes. He was a Vice-President of the Geological Society of Africa and Chairman of the South African Committee for Stratigraphy. He retired from UP in 2019 and has since been working as a freelance geological consultant in Pretoria.
Affiliations and expertise
South African Committee for Stratigraphy, Pretoria