Document type
Journal articles
Document subtype
Full paper
Title
Weak tides during Cryogenian glaciations
Participants in the publication
J. A. Mattias Green (Author)
Hannah S. Davies (Author)
Instituto Dom Luiz (IDL), Faculdade de Ciências, Universidade de Lisboa, Campo Grande, 1749–016, Lisboa, Portugal
Joao C. Duarte (Author)
Dep. Geologia
Dep. Geologia
IDL
Jessica R. Creveling (Author)
Christopher Scotese (Author)
Summary
The severe “Snowball Earth” glaciations proposed to have existed during the Cryogenian period (720 to 635 million years ago) coincided with the breakup of one supercontinent and assembly of another. Whereas the presence of extensive continental ice sheets predicts a tidally energetic Snowball ocean due to the reduced ocean depth, the supercontinent palaeogeography predicts weak tides because the surrounding ocean is too large to host tidal resonances. Here we show, using an established numerical global tidal model and paleogeographic reconstructions, that the Cryogenian ocean hosted diminished tidal amplitudes and associated energy dissipation rates, reaching 10–50% of today’s rates, during the Snowball glaciations. We argue that the near-absence of Cryogenian tidal processes may have been one contributor to the prolonged glaciations if these were near-global. These results also constrain lunar distance and orbital evolution throughout the Cryogenian, and highlight that simulations of past oceans should include explicit tidally driven mixing processes.
Date of Publication
2020-12
Where published
Nature Communications
Publication Identifiers
ISSN - 2041-1723
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Document Identifiers
DOI -
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-20008-3
URL -
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-20008-3
Rankings
SCOPUS (2020) -
Web Of Science Q1 (2020) - 14.919 - Science
SCIMAGO Q1 (2020) - 5.56 - Physics and Astronomy