Archean Carbonates

(Student Megan Murphy is working on parts of this project. Current funding is from NASA Astrobiology: Exobiology and Evolutionary Biology and the Agouron Institute)

Archean* carbonates record ocean chemistry prior to the rise in atmospheric oxygen, preserve evidence for complex microbial communities, and provide constraints on the subsidence of Archean cratons. Check out our drilling project web page: Agouron Griqualand Drilling Project.

The outcrop photo on the right show Archean stromatolites from Boetsap, South Africa. They are composed of calcite that precipitated on and in microbial mats in a shallow subtidal environment. The hand lens on top of the outcrop is 2 cm across.

Archean Carbonate Papers:

Sumner, Dawn Y. and John P. Grotzinger, 2004. Abstract or Full Text (eScholarship Repository)
Calcite and Aragonite Precipitation in the Neoarchean Campbellrand-Malmani Carbonate Platform, South Africa, Sedimentology, v. 51, p. 1-27, doi: 10.1111/j.1365-3091.2004.00670.x.
Sumner, Dawn Y., 2001. Abstract
Decimeter-thick encrustations of calcite and aragonite on the sea floor and implications for Neoarchean and Neoproterozoic ocean chemistry, in Precambrian Sedimentary Environments: A Modern Approach to Ancient Depositional Systems (W. Altermann and P.L. Corcoran, eds.) Special Publication #33 of the International Association of Sedimentologists, Blackwell, p. 107-120.
Sumner, Dawn Y. and John P. Grotzinger, 2000. Abstract
Late Archean aragonite precipitation: Petrography, facies associations, and environmental significance, in Carbonate Sedimentation and Diagenesis in the Evolving Precambrian World (J. P. Grotzinger and N. P. James, eds). SEPM Special Publication #67, p. 123-144.
Sumner, Dawn Y., 1997. Abstract (at the AJS site)
Carbonate precipitation and oxygen stratification in late Archean seawater as deduced from facies and stratigraphy of the Gamohaan and Frisco formations, Transvaal Supergroup, South Africa. American Journal of Science, v. 297, p. 455-487.
Sumner, Dawn Y. and John P. Grotzinger, 1996. Abstract (At the GSA/Geology site, connect to p. 119)
Were kinetics of Archean calcium carbonate precipitation related to oxygen concentration? Geology, v. 24, p. 119-122.
Sumner, Dawn Y. and John P. Grotzinger, 1996. Abstract
Herringbone calcite: Petrography and environmental significance. Journal of Sedimentary Research, v. 66, p. 419-429.


Return to:
Dawn's Research Page
Dawn's Home Page
Department of Geology Home Page


Dawn Y. Sumner
Department of Geology
University of California
Davis, CA 95616
dysumner@ucdavis.edu