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News From the Field

There and back again: Mantle xenon has a story to tell


August 8, 2018

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Volatiles -- such as water, carbon dioxide and the noble gases -- come out of the Earth's interior through volcanism and may be injected into the mantle from the atmosphere, a pair of processes called mantle degassing and re-gassing. The exchange controls the habitability of the planet. This transport could not have begun much before 2.5 billion years ago, according to new research that also establishes a range of dates during which the Earth shifted to a net re-gassing regime. Full Story

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Washington University in St. Louis

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