Палеомагнетизм: Исследование магнитного поля Земли в прошлом

Study of Earth's magnetic field in past

Paleomagnetism (occasionally palaeomagnetism) is the study of prehistoric Earth's magnetic fields recorded in rocks, sediment, or archeological materials. Geophysicists who specialize in paleomagnetism are called paleomagnetists. Certain magnetic minerals in rocks can record the direction and intensity of Earth's magnetic field at the time they formed. This record provides information on the past behavior of the geomagnetic field and the past location of tectonic plates. The record of geomagnetic reversals preserved in volcanic and sedimentary rock sequences (magnetostratigraphy) provides a time scale that is used as a geochronologic tool. Evidence from paleomagnetism led to the revival of the continental drift hypothesis and its transformation into the modern theory of plate tectonics. Apparent polar wander paths provided the first clear geophysical evidence for continental drift, while marine magnetic anomalies did the same for seafloor spreading. Paleomagnetic data continues to extend the history of plate tectonics back in time, constraining the ancient position and movement of continents and continental fragments (terranes). The field of paleomagnetism also encompasses equivalent measurements of samples from other Solar System bodies, such as Moon rocks and meteorites, where it is used to investigate the ancient magnetic fields of those bodies and dynamo theory. Paleomagnetism relies on developments in rock magnetism and overlaps with biomagnetism, magnetic fabrics (used as strain indicators in rocks and soils), and environmental magnetism.

As early as the 18th century, it was noticed that compass needles deviated near strongly magnetized outcrops. In 1797, Alexander von Humboldt attributed this magnetization to lightning strikes (and lightning strikes do often magnetize surface rocks). British physicist P. M. S. Blackett provided a major impetus to paleomagnetism by inventing a sensitive astatic magnetometer in 1956. His intent was to test his theory that the geomagnetic field was related to Earth's rotation, a theory that he ultimately rejected; but the astatic magnetometer became the basic tool of paleomagnetism and led to a revival of the theory of continental drift. Alfred Wegener first proposed in 1915 that continents had once been joined together and had since moved apart. Although he produced an abundance of circumstantial evidence, his theory met with little acceptance for two reasons: (1) no mechanism for continental drift was known, and (2) there was no way to reconstruct the movements of the continents over time. Keith Runcorn and Edward A. Irving constructed apparent polar wander paths for Europe and North America. These curves diverged but could be reconciled if it was assumed that the continents had been in contact up to 200 million years ago. This provided the first clear geophysical evidence for continental drift. Then in 1963, Morley, Vine and Matthews showed that marine magnetic anomalies provided evidence for seafloor spreading.

The study of paleomagnetism is possible because iron bearing minerals such as magnetite may record past polarity of Earth's magnetic field. Magnetic signatures in rocks can be recorded by several different mechanisms.

Iron titanium oxide minerals in basalt and other igneous rocks may preserve the direction of Earth's magnetic field when the rocks cool through the Curie temperatures of those minerals. The Curie temperature of magnetite, a spinel group iron oxide, is about 580 °C, whereas most basalt and gabbro are completely crystallized at temperatures below 900 °C. Hence, the mineral grains are not rotated physically to align with Earth's magnetic field, but rather they may record the orientation of that field. The record so preserved is called a thermoremanent magnetization (TRM). Because complex oxidation reactions may occur as igneous rocks cool after crystallization, the orientations of Earth's magnetic field are not always accurately recorded, nor is the record necessarily maintained. Nonetheless, the record has been preserved well enough in basalts of oceanic crust to have been critical in the development of theories of sea floor spreading related to plate tectonics. TRM can also be recorded in pottery kilns, hearths, and burned adobe buildings. The discipline based on the study of thermoremanent magnetisation in archaeological materials is called archaeomagnetic dating. Although the Māori people of New Zealand do not make pottery, their 700 to 800 year old steam ovens, or hāngī, provide adequate archaeomagnetic material.

In a completely different process, magnetic grains in sediments may align with the magnetic field during or soon after deposition; this is known as detrital remanent magnetization. If the magnetization is acquired as the grains are deposited, the result is a depositional detrital remanent magnetization; if it is acquired soon after deposition, it is a post depositional detrital remanent magnetization.

In a third process, magnetic grains grow during chemical reactions and record the direction of the magnetic field at the time of their formation. The field is said to be recorded by chemical remanent magnetization (CRM). A common form is held by the mineral hematite, another iron oxide. Hematite forms through chemical oxidation reactions of other minerals in the rock including magnetite. Red beds, clastic sedimentary rocks (such as sandstones) are red because of hematite that formed during sedimentary diagenesis. The CRM signatures in red beds can be quite useful, and they are common targets in magnetostratigraphy studies.

Paleomagnetic evidence of both reversals and polar wandering data was instrumental in verifying the theories of continental drift and plate tectonics in the 1960s and 1970s. Some applications of paleomagnetic evidence to reconstruct histories of terranes have continued to arouse controversies. Paleomagnetic evidence is also used in constraining possible ages for rocks and processes and in reconstructions of the deformational histories of parts of the crust. Reversal magnetostratigraphy is often used to estimate the age of sites bearing fossils and hominin remains. Conversely, for a fossil of known age, the paleomagnetic data can fix the latitude at which the fossil was laid down. Such a paleolatitude provides information about the geological environment at the time of deposition. Paleomagnetic studies are combined with geochronological methods to determine absolute ages for rocks in which the magnetic record is preserved. For igneous rocks such as basalt, commonly used methods include potassium–argon and argon–argon geochronology.