Earth's accretion inferred from iron isotopic anomalies of supernova nuclear statistical equilibrium origin

TL;DR

This study uses high-precision iron isotopic data from meteorites to trace Earth's building blocks and identify supernova origins of certain isotopic anomalies, revealing consistent isotopic signatures across Earth's accretion materials.

Contribution

It demonstrates that Earth's mantle isotopic composition aligns with meteorite signatures, indicating a supernova origin of the Fe isotopic anomalies and challenging the role of CI chondrites in Earth's Fe delivery.

Findings

Earth's mantle isotopic composition is similar to certain meteorite groups.

Fe isotopic anomalies are linked to supernova nucleosynthesis.

CI chondrites are unlikely major contributors of Earth's Fe.

Abstract

Nucleosynthetic Fe isotopic anomalies in meteorites may be used to reconstruct the early dynamical evolution of the solar system and to identify the origin and nature of the material that built planets. Using high-precision iron isotopic data of 23 iron meteorites from nine major chemical groups we show that all iron meteorites show the same fundamental dichotomy between non-carbonaceous (NC) and a carbonaceous (CC) meteorites previously observed for other elements. The Fe isotopic anomalies are predominantly produced by variation in 54Fe, where all CC iron meteorites are characterized by an excess in 54Fe relative to NC iron meteorites. This excess in 54Fe is accompanied by an excess in 58Ni observed in the same CC meteorite groups. Together, these overabundances of 54Fe and 58Ni are produced by nuclear statistical equilibrium either in type Ia supernovae or in the Si/S shell of core-collapse supernovae. The new Fe isotopic data reveal that Earth's mantle plots on or close to correlations defined by Fe, Mo, and Ru isotopic anomalies in iron meteorites, indicating that throughout Earth's accretion, the isotopic composition of its building blocks did not drastically change. While Earth's mantle has a similar Fe isotopic composition to CI chondrites, the latter are clearly distinct from Earth's mantle for other elements (e.g., Cr and Ni) whose delivery to Earth coincided with Fe. The fact that CI chondrites exhibit large Cr and Ni isotopic anomalies relative to Earth's mantle, therefore, demonstrates that CI chondrites are unlikely to have contributed significant Fe to Earth.