Understanding of secular evolution of the Earth system is based largely on the rock and
mineral archive preserved in the continental lithosphere. Based on the frequency and range …

TTGs (tonalite–trondhjemite–granodiorite) are one of the archetypical lithologies of
Archaean cratons. Since their original description in the 1970s, they have been the subject …

The recognition that Earth history has been punctuated by supercontinents, the assembly
and breakup of which have profoundly influenced the evolution of the geosphere …

Continental crust is the archive of Earth history. The spatial and temporal distribution of
Earth's record of rock units and events is heterogeneous; for example, ages of igneous …

A worldwide database of over 13,800 integrated U–Pb and Hf-isotope analyses of zircon,
derived largely from detrital sources, has been used to examine processes of crustal …

The secular trend of seawater strontium isotope ratio (87 Sr/86 Sr) reflects changes in the
relative contributions of continental versus mantle reservoirs to ocean composition, and …

The strong resilience of the mineral zircon and its ability to host a wealth of isotopic
information make it the best deep-time archive of Earth's continental crust. Zircon is found in …

Reconstructing Earth history during the Hadean defies the traditional rock-based approach
in geology. Given the extremely limited locality of Hadean zircons, some indirect approach …

Abstract Models for when and how the continental crust was formed are constrained by
estimates in the rates of crustal growth. The record of events preserved in the continental …

The record of the continental lithosphere is patchy and incomplete; no known rock is older
than 4.02 Ga, and less than 5% of the rocks preserved are older than 3 Ga. In addition, there …