Evolution of Earth’s Earliest Crust

地球的陆壳和洋壳在太阳系中可能是独一无二的，在我们星球的岩石圈、大气层和生物圈的运行中发挥着核心作用。地壳在地球历史早期形成和稳定的机制一直是地质科学中悬而未决的问题之一。在这份申请中，我建议通过扩大我正在进行的西北地区Acasta片麻岩杂岩(AGC)的研究计划来解决这个问题。AGC可以说包含了世界上最古老的岩石(40.2亿年前)，而且肯定是世界上少数几个可以证明地球历史前10亿年的证据的地点之一。尽管它是一个古老的地壳所在地，但AGC的大部分仍未得到研究。特别是，以前对AGC的所有研究都只集中在~30公里

Earth’s continental and oceanic crust, the combination of which is likely unique in the solar system, plays a central role in the operation of our planet’s lithosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere. The mechanisms by which this crust formed and stabilized early in Earth history remains one of the outstanding questions in the geological sciences. In this application, I propose to address this question by expanding my on-going research program on the Acasta Gneiss Complex (AGC) of the Northwest Territories. The AGC arguably contains the oldest rocks in the world (4.02 billion years old) and is certainly one of the few locations worldwide where evidence can be brought to bear on the first one billion years of Earth history. Despite its status as an old crust locality, much of the AGC remains unstudied. In particular, all previous studies of the AGC have focused exclusively on a ~30 km