Related papers: Late Delivery of Nitrogen to Earth
New independent constraints on the amount of water delivered to Earth by comets are derived using the 15N/14N isotopic ratio, measured to be roughly twice as high in cometary CN and HCN as in the present Earth. Under reasonable assumptions,…
Nitrogen is the most common element in Earth's atmosphere and also appears to be present in significant amounts in the mantle. However, its long-term cycling between these two reservoirs remains poorly understood. Here a range of biotic and…
Bioavailable nitrogen is thought to be a requirement for the origin and sustenance of life. Before the onset of biological nitrogen fixation, abiotic pathways to fix atmospheric N2 must have been prominent to provide bioavailable nitrogen…
The isotopic compositions of terrestrial hydrogen and nitrogen are clearly different from those of the nebular gas from which the solar system formed, and also differ from most of cometary values. Terrestrial N and H isotopic compositions…
This brief review will discuss the current knowledge on the origin and evolution of the nitrogen atmospheres of the icy bodies in the solar system, particularly of Titan, Triton and Pluto. An important tool to analyse and understand the…
Isotopic ratios are keys to understanding the origin and early evolution of the solar system in the context of Galactic nucleosynthesis. The large range of measured $^{14}$N/$^{15}$N isotopic ratios in the solar system reflects distinct…
Molecular nitrogen is the most commonly assumed background gas that supports habitability on rocky planets. Despite its chemical inertness, nitrogen molecule is broken by lightning, hot volcanic vents, and bolide impacts, and can be…
Earth's volatile elements (H, C, and N) are essential to maintaining habitable conditions for metazoans and simpler life forms. However, identifying the sources (comets, meteorites, and trapped nebular gas) that supplied volatiles to Earth…
The ratio of nitrogen isotopes in the Martian atmosphere is a key constraint on the planet's atmospheric evolution. However, enrichment of the heavy isotope expected due to atmospheric loss from sputtering and photochemical processes is…
Atmospheric compositions preserve the history of planet formation processes. Jupiter has the remarkable feature of being uniformly enriched in various elements compared to the Sun, including highly volatile elements such as nitrogen and…
Understanding the atmosphere's composition during the Archean eon is a fundamental issue to unravel ancient environmental conditions. We show from the analysis of nitrogen and argon isotopes in fluid inclusions trapped in 3.0-3.5 Ga…
The isotopic ratio of nitrogen measured in primitive Solar System bodies shows a broad range of values, the origin of which remains unknown. One key question is whether these isotopic reservoirs of nitrogen predate the comet formation stage…
The composition of an atmosphere has integrated the geological history of the entire planetary body. However, the long-term evolutions of the atmospheres of the terrestrial planets are not well documented. For Earth, there were until…
The Earth's N2-dominated atmosphere is a very special feature. Firstly, N2 as main gas is unique on the terrestrial planets in the inner solar system and gives a hint for tectonic activity. Studying the origins of atmospheric nitrogen and…
We use the C/N ratio as a monitor of the delivery of key ingredients of life to nascent terrestrial worlds. Total elemental C and N contents, and their ratio, are examined for the interstellar medium, comets, chondritic meteorites and…
The Texas Echelon cross Echelle Spectrograph (TEXES), mounted on NASA's Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF), was used to map mid-infrared ammonia absorption features on both Jupiter and Saturn in February 2013. Ammonia is the principle…
Nitrogen is a major nutrient for all life on Earth and could plausibly play a similar role in extraterrestrial biospheres. The major reservoir of nitrogen at Earth's surface is atmospheric N2, but recent studies have proposed that the size…
We explore the chemistry and observability of nitrogen dominated atmospheres for ultra-short-period super-Earths. We base the assumption, that super-Earths could have nitrogen filled atmospheres, on observations of 55 Cnc e that favour a…
The origin of life on Earth would benefit from a prebiotic atmosphere that produced nitriles, like HCN, which enable ribonucleotide synthesis. However, geochemical evidence suggests that Hadean air was relatively oxidizing with negligible…
One of the most important subjects of debate in the formation of the solar system is the origin of Earth's water. Comets have long been considered as the most likely source of the delivery of water to Earth. However, elemental and isotopic…