Monitoring Earth Evolution through Time (MEET)

The ERC Synergy Grants 2019, collaborative research projects

The MEET project will receive 12.8€ over 6 years to investigate Earth’s evolution since its creation. The project is led by 3 researchers from 3 institutions in France, Germany and USA, and is held by the Université Grenoble Alpes’ Alexander Sobolev, professor at the ISTerre laboratory (CNRS/IRD/UGA/USMB/IFFSTTAR).

This project will investigate two main questions: How has Earth’s chemical composition evolved over time? And what physical processes are responsible for these changes?

Previous attempts to understand the early Earth have been stymied because rocks that are archives from this time are either destroyed or altered so that the original chemical information is gone. However, there is a unique possibility to retrieve the chemical tracers most sensitive to changes of Earth’s mantle and crust. This information is preserved as melt inclusions in crystals of minerals olivine and zircon. These are tiny drops of melt that were trapped when the mineral crystallized. They typically measure less than 15 microns and weigh just a few nanograms.

The unique microanalytical equipment for in-situ chemical analysis of such inclusions will be installed in IS Terre UGA and will deliver new information on the recycling of chemical elements in the Earth and on formation of its crust since about 4.4 billion years ago to present day. The evolution of Earth has profound implications for questions in other disciplines such as the origin of life and the conditions on exoplanets.

The European Research Council started the ERC Synergy Grants 2019, with a global budget of 363 million euros, to finance exploratory research project in all disciplines for a maximum period of 6 years. This funding is part of the EU’s research and innovation programme, Horizon 2020. Of the 37 laureats, the MEET project lead by Alexander Sobolev (Université Grenoble Alpes), Stephen Sobolev (GFZ Potsdam, Germany), and John Valley (University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA) will receive 12.8€ over the course of 6 years, 6.6€ of which for the Université Grenoble Alpes.
The objective of the Synergy Grant is to enable a small group of two to four Principal Investigators and their teams to bring together complementary skills, knowledge, and resources in new ways, in order to jointly address research problems. The ERC shall provide attractive and flexible funding to enable creative researchers and their teams to pursue the most promising avenues at the frontier of science, in order to find solutions to complex multidisciplinary research problems. The ambition is to open the way for results that are more impactful collectively than the sum of the individual contributions.

PROJECT Corresponding Principal Investigator

Pr. Alexander Sobolev (UGA)

Distinguished Professor at University Grenoble Alpes, Alexander Sobolev received his PhD in Geochemistry in 1983 from the Vernadsky Institute in Moscow. In 1999, he was awarded the Alexander von Humboldt prize, then in 2001 the prestigious German Wolfgang Paul Prize to set a laboratory in Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Mainz, Germany. He joined the Université Grenoble Alpes (former Université Joseph Fourier) in 2009 with an Excellence Chair. Alexander Sobolev is an academician of Russian Academy of Sciences, member of the Academia Europae, of the Institut universitaire de France (senior membre, IUF), Gauss Professor of Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities, Germany, Fellow of American Geophysical Union and Geochemistry Fellow of Geochemistry Society and European Association of Geochemistry. Google Scholar Profile

PROJECT Principal Investigators

Pr. Stephen Sobolev (GFZ Potsdam, Germany)

Professor of Geodynamics in Institute of Geosciences at University of Potsdam jointly with GFZ Potsdam. Received PhD in Physics and Mathematics (Geophysics) in 1980 at Schmidt Institute of Physics of the Earth, Moscow, Russia. Has joined GFZ Potsdam at 1997 after being visiting Professor at the Institute Physique du Globe, Univ. Strasbourg, France, and A.-v.-Humboldt Research Fellow and then Research Associate at the Geophysical Institute, University Karlsruhe in 1992-1997. Before that was Research Associate and then Head of Modeling Section at Schmidt Institute of Physics of the Earth, Moscow. In 2008 founded Section 2.5 “Geodynamic Modeling” at GFZ Potsdam and became its Head. Member of the Academia Europae, 2021. Google Scholar Profile

Pr. John Valley (University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA)

John Valley received his PhD in 1980 from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. He is the Charles R. Van Hise Distinguished Professor at The University of Wisconsin- Madison where he has taught since 1983. He is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Geophysical Union, the European Association of Geochemistry, the Geochemical Society, the Geological Society of America, the Mineralogical Society of America, and the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters. He received the Day Medal from GSA, the N.L. Bowen Award from AGU and the Hilldale Award from UW-Madison. He was President of MSA (2005-06) and a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Edinburgh (1989-90). Google Scholar Profile

PROJECT analytical resources

Microanalytical Platform, ISTerre, University Grenoble Alpes, Grenoble, France

Wisconsin Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometer Laboratory- Ion Probe (SIMS), University Wisconsin- Madison, USA

PPOJECT partners

PETROLOGY GROUP OF MINERALOGY
GOTTFRIED WILHELM
LEIBNIZ UNIVERSITAET HANNOVER
Germany

DEPARTMENT OF EARTH SYSTEM
ANALYSIS POTSDAM INSTITUT
FUER KLIMAFOLGENFORSCHUNG
Germany