posted on 2024-11-16, 03:34authored byHolly Taylor, Isaac Kell-Duivestein, Juraj Farkas, Martin Dietzel, Anthony DossetoAnthony Dosseto
Lithium (Li) isotopes in marine carbonates have considerable potential as a proxy to constrain past changes in silicate weathering fluxes and improve our understanding of Earth's climate. To date the majority of Li isotope studies on marine carbonates have focussed on calcium carbonates. The determination of the Li isotope fractionation between dolomite and a dolomitizing fluid would allow us to extend investigations to deep times (i.e. Precambrian) when dolostones were the most abundant marine carbonate archives. Dolostones often contain a significant proportion of detrital silicate material, which dominates the Li budget; thus, pretreatment needs to be designed so that only the isotope composition of the carbonate-associated Li is measured. This study aims to serve two main goals: (1) to determine the Li isotope fractionation between Ca-Mg carbonates and solution, and (2) to develop a method for leaching the carbonate-associated Li out of dolostone while not affecting the Li contained within the detrital portion of the rock. We synthesized Ca-Mg carbonates at high temperatures (150 to 220 ∘C) and measured the Li isotope composition (δ7Li) of the precipitated solids and their respective reactive solutions. The relationship of the Li isotope fractionation factor with temperature was obtained ...
Funding
Tectonic geography of the world's oldest petroleum play, the McArthur Basin
Taylor, H. L., Kell Duivestein, I. J., Farkas, J., Dietzel, M. & Dosseto, A. (2019). Technical note: Lithium isotopes in dolostone as a palaeo-environmental proxy - an experimental approach. Climate of the Past, 15 (2), 635-646.