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Mechanisms and climatic-ecological effects of the Great Oxidation Event in the early Proterozoic

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Abstract

This paper briefly introduces the conception and research history of the Great Oxidation Event (GOE) in the early Paleoproterozoic and summarizes the primary geological and geochemical records of this event. On the basis of these, we overview the significant progress in three fields of the GOE: the timing and process of its startup, its mechanisms, and its climatic-ecological effects. The records of mass-independent fractionation of sulfur isotopes suggest that the startup of the GOE might be multi-episodic, which is obviously inconsistent with the single-episodic opinion obtained from atmospheric model simulations. The fundamental mechanism of the GOE was the source of the atmospheric O2 exceeding the sink, but it remains uncertain whether it was due to the increase in the source or the decrease in the sink. The GOE substantially affected the climate, biological evolution, and biogeochemical cycles, but the specific processes remain elusive. In consideration of the current progress, we propose four aspects for future explorations, including the construction of geological and geochemical proxies for extremely low atmospheric oxygen content (pO2), how the GOE changed the evolutions of Earth’s habitability and the processes in deep Earth, and constraining the mechanism of the GOE by coupling geological events with different time scales.

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Acknowledgements

We send our sincere thanks to Prof. Shucheng XIE, Xiaoying SHI, Guochun ZHAO, Shuguang LI, and Jianping HUANG, who read the draft of this paper and provided constructive comments. Dr. Christopher JUNIUM at Syracuse University polished the English. The responsible editor and two anonymous reviewers are also thanked for their comments and suggestions. This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 41821001, 42172216, 41873027), the Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Grant No. XDB26000000), and the 111 Project of China (Grant No. BP0820004).

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  1. State Key Laboratory of Biogeology and Environmental Geology, and School of Earth Sciences, China University of Geosciences, Wuhan, 430074, China

    Genming Luo & Chaoqun Jiao

  2. MNR Key Laboratory of Isotope Geology, MNR Key Laboratory of Deep-Earth Dynamics, Institute of Geology, Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences, Beijing, 100037, China

    Xiangkun Zhu

  3. State Key Laboratory of Geological Processes and Mineral Resources, China University of Geosciences, Beijing, 100083, China

    Shuijiong Wang

  4. State Key Laboratory of Biogeology and Environmental Geology, China University of Geosciences, Beijing, 100083, China

    Shihong Zhang

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Luo, G., Zhu, X., Wang, S. et al. Mechanisms and climatic-ecological effects of the Great Oxidation Event in the early Proterozoic. Sci. China Earth Sci. 65, 1646–1672 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11430-021-9934-y

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