The Middle Proterozoic Record of Tectonic, Biogeochemical, and Eukaryotic Evolution

地球的中年，大约在18亿到8亿年前，见证了早期真核生物的多样化和环境的逐渐氧化，为动物的起源奠定了基础。这段10亿年的时间间隔被两个超级大陆的形成所包围，这两个超级大陆的组装和解体可能深刻地影响了海洋化学和沉积物矿藏的空间和时间分布。阐明中元古代构造、生物地球化学和真核生物演化之间的模式和联系是一项重大的科学挑战，加拿大北部广泛保存完好的中元古代沉积记录使这一挑战成为可能。 在接下来的五年里，我将领导一项跨学科的努力，记录和校准中元古代古环境变化的记录，并测试不断演变的生物圈、海洋氧合作用和板块构造之间的相互联系和反馈。这项研究计划将以加拿大北部的野外工作为基础，重点了解和分析这些记录被存档的沉积序列。因此，这项研究将需要致力于元古界沉积盆地的地层和沉积学分析的野外季节，以更好地约束它们的时代、构造背景和地质历史。这项实地工作还将收集适当的高质量样品，用于不同的分析和询问沉积记录的方法，包括辐射测年、同位素地球化学、微古生物学和古地磁学。分析工作将由我的高技能和多样化的研究小组以及具有互补的专业研究专业知识的同事执行。将优先为总部提供培训尖端分析方法的机会。由此产生的数据将有助于记录中元古代环境的演变，并开发和测试驱动这些变化的机制模型。同时，这些数据将提供沉积环境的地层对比和解释。在本研究计划过程中收集的样本将被仔细编目，并供其他研究项目使用。 这项研究计划将完善加拿大北极元古代盆地的地层格架，其起源将与北美元古代构造演化的新兴模式联系在一起。这些盆地的数据又将与其他中元古代盆地的数据集相结合，以便更好地标定和建立中元古代地质年表。这些结果将为这些盆地的经济潜力提供信息，并为了解作为早期复杂生命摇篮的全球古环境提供新的线索。

Earth's middle age, ca. 1.8 to 0.8 billion years ago, witnessed the diversification of early eukaryotic and the gradual oxygenation of the environment that set the stage for the origin of animals. This billion-year interval was bracketed by the formation of two supercontinents whose assembly and break-up likely profoundly influenced ocean chemistry and the spatial and temporal distribution of sediment-hosted mineral deposits. Elucidating the patterns and linkages between tectonic, biogeochemical, and eukaryotic evolution during the middle Proterozoic Era is a grand scientific challenge that is made possible by the extensive and well-preserved middle Proterozoic sedimentary record in northern Canada. In the next five years, I will lead an interdisciplinary effort to document and calibrate the middle Proterozoic record of paleoenvironmental change and test the interconnections and feedbacks between the evolving biosphere, ocean oxygenation, and plate tectonics. This research program will be grounded in fieldwork in northern Canada and focused on understanding and parsing the sedimentary successions in which these records are archived. Hence, this research will entail field seasons devoted to stratigraphic and sedimentological analysis of Proterozoic sedimentary basins to better constrain their age, tectonic context, and geological history. This fieldwork will also serve to collect appropriate high quality samples for diverse analyses and approaches to interrogating the sedimentary record, including radiometric dating, isotope geochemistry, micropaleontology, and paleomagnetism. Analytical work will be performed by my highly skilled and diverse research group and by colleagues with complementary, specialized research expertise. Providing HQP with the opportunity to train in cutting edge analytical methods will be prioritized. Resulting data will serve both to document the evolution of the middle Proterozoic environment and to develop and test mechanistic models for what drove these changes. At the same time, these data will inform stratigraphic correlations and interpretations of depositional environments. Samples collected over the course of this research program will be carefully catalogued and made available for other research projects. This research program will improve the stratigraphic framework for Proterozoic basins in Arctic Canada, the origin of which will be linked with emerging models for the tectonic evolution of Proterozoic North America. Data from these basins will in turn be integrated with datasets from other middle Proterozoic basins in order to better calibrate and construct the middle Proterozoic geological time scale. These results will both inform the economic potential of these basins and shed new light on the global paleoenvironment that was the cradle of early complex life.