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Geochemistry

Rise of the continents

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The continents are archives of Earth's evolution. Analysis of the isotopic signature of continental crust globally suggests that buoyant, silicic continents began to form 3 billion years ago, possibly linked to the onset of plate tectonics.

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Figure 1: Continental evolution.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cin-Ty A. Lee is in the Department of Earth Science, Rice University, 6100 Main Street, Houston, Texas 77005, USA,

    Cin-Ty A. Lee

  2. N. Ryan McKenzie is in the Department of Geology and Geophysics, Yale University, 210 Whitney Avenue, New Haven, Connecticut 06511, USA,

    N. Ryan McKenzie

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  1. Cin-Ty A. Lee
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  2. N. Ryan McKenzie
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Correspondence to Cin-Ty A. Lee.

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Lee, CT., McKenzie, N. Rise of the continents. Nature Geosci 8, 506–507 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2476

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