A group of researchers says they have found evidence that, in its origins, the earth had more hydrogen than was thought, which questions what was believed about the origins of water and the evolution of our planet.
Scientists from the University of Oxford analyzed a rare meteorite known as the Condrita de Estatita.
The space rock dates from about 4.6 billion years ago and and it is believed that it has a composition similar to that of the primitive land, according to a study published Wednesday in the magazine Icarus.
The researchers discovered that most of the hydrogen contained in the meteorite was intrinsic, instead of being present due to pollution, which suggests that the earth would have had enough hydrogen to allow the formation of water molecules.
This finding questions the general belief that hydrogen reached the earth in asteroids that impacted on what was previously a dry and rocky planet unable to house life.
“We assumed that the Earth has water today due to a fairly fortunate situation in which it had been beaten by these asteroids,” the main author of the study, Tom Barrett, a doctoral student in the Department of Earth Sciences of the University of Oxford, told CNN.
“But what has shown in this study is that, in reality, the material that formed the Earth in the first instance contained a large amount of hydrogen and oxygen,” he added.
“The discovery of hydrogen in this meteorite means that the earth could have been hydrated or wet since its formation.”
As for why the hydrogen levels identified in the study had not been detected above, Barrett explained that the chemical element is difficult to measure, especially in such low concentrations. The detection was only possible thanks to a technique known as X-ray Absorption Near Edge Structure (X-ray absorption spectroscopy near the edge structure), or Xanes spectroscopy, he said.
“To do that you need a particle accelerator,” he added.
“This is a huge, really expensive installation, which we have been very lucky to have been able to use for this study. But it is not exactly the type of experiment that can be done in the house garage,” he said.
The study could drastically change our understanding of the beginnings of the earth, but the discovery of hydrogen in the meteorite does not mean that life would necessarily evolve before, said Barrett. This is because the ability to evolve on a planet can depend more on the way it evolves, than the material of the one formed, he said.
Hydrogen at the beginning of the Earth
A team of scientists from the National Center for Scientific Research in France had previously analyzed the meteorite, known as LAR 12252, which was found in Antarctica.
The August 2020 study discovered that the space rocks, or tiny spherical objects, and the organic material contained inside had traces of hydrogen.
The investigation, however, only took into account a part of the hydrogen that was inside the meteorite.
The investigators of the new study believed that within the meteorite there could be more hydrogen attached to sulfur.
The team detected, unexpectedly, hydrogen sulphide within the fine matrix that surrounds the strokes, “on average almost 10 times more” of hydrogen sulfide than the one found in spherical objects, according to the study.
“We were very excited when the analysis told us that the sample contained hydrogen sulfide, but not where we expected!” Barrett said in a statement.
“Since the probability that this hydrogen sulfide would be generated due to earthly pollution is very low, this research provides vital evidence to support the theory that water on Earth is innate, which is a natural result of the elements that make up our planet.”
The role of the impact of asteroids and comets
Barrett plans to analyze more meteorites with the purpose of determining exactly how much hydrogen would have been present on Earth and how much may have been transported to it by external sources.
Finding out how the Earth came to look like today is a fundamental question for planetary scientists, said the study co -author, James Bryson, associate professor of the Department of Earth Sciences of the University of Oxford.
“Now we believe that the material that our planet created, which we can study using these rare meteorites, was much richer in hydrogen than we thought previously,” he said.
He added: “This finding bases the idea that water formation on Earth was a natural process, instead of a chance that hydrated asteroids bombard our planet after their formation.”
Matt Genge, a planetary scientist at Imperial College in London, who did not participate in the study, told CNN that, although the study is an “interesting result”, the test is not enough to cancel the theory about the origins of water on earth, which was in force for many years.
The meteorite in question had been in Antarctica probably for hundreds of thousands of years, he said, and it is impossible to completely rule out the possibility that hydrogen has formed during that time.
“Only the fact that there is a possibility subtracts strength from the argument,” said Genge.
Bryson acknowledged that the meteorite is likely to be on earth for many years before he was collected, but firmly supports the results of the study.
“We believe that we have made all possible efforts on our workflow during the analysis to mitigate the impact of land water on our results, and we believe that only part of the total amount of H (hydrogen) in the meteorite is due to the water of the earth (perhaps around 15%),” Bryson said by email in response to the Gengeal Declaration.
“We also think that some H (hydrogen) was transported by asteroids and comets, however, we now believe that this is a small proportion of the total H (hydrogen) that is found in our entire planet. So the matt assessment of this meteorite is justified, but we strive to minimize its concern.”
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