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Micromagnetic Tomography for Paleomagnetism and Rock-Magnetism
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  • Lennart de Groot,
  • Karl Fabian,
  • Annemarieke Béguin,
  • Martha Kosters,
  • David Cortés-Ortuño,
  • Roger Fu,
  • Chloë Jansen,
  • Richard Harrison,
  • Tristan van Leeuwen,
  • Auke Barnhoorn
Lennart de Groot
Utrecht University

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Karl Fabian
Norwegian University of Science and Technology
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Annemarieke Béguin
Norwegian University of Science and Technology
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Martha Kosters
Utrecht University
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David Cortés-Ortuño
Utrecht University
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Roger Fu
Harvard University
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Chloë Jansen
Utrecht University
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Richard Harrison
University of Cambridge
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Tristan van Leeuwen
Centrum Wiskunde en Informatica, Universiteit Utrecht
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Auke Barnhoorn
Delft University of Technology
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Abstract

Our understanding of the past behavior of the geomagnetic field arises from magnetic signals stored in geological materials, e.g. (volcanic) rocks. Bulk rock samples, however, often contain magnetic grains that differ in chemistry, size and shape; some of them record the Earth’s magnetic field well, others are unreliable. The presence of a small amount of adverse behaved magnetic grains in a sample may already obscure important information on the past state of the geomagnetic field. Recently it was shown that it is possible to determine magnetizations of individual grains in a sample by combining X-ray computed tomography and magnetic surface scanning measurements. Here we establish this new Micromagnetic Tomography (MMT) technique and make it suitable for use with different magnetic scanning techniques, and for both synthetic and natural samples. We acquired reliable magnetic directions by selecting subsets of grains in a synthetic sample, and we obtained rock-magnetic information of individual grains in a volcanic sample. This illustrates that MMT opens up entirely new venues of paleomagnetic and rock-magnetic research. MMT’s unique ability to determine the magnetization of individual grains in a nondestructive way allows for a systematic analysis of how geological materials record and retain information on the past state of the Earth’s magnetic field. Moreover, by interpreting only the contributions of known magnetically well-behaved grains in a sample MMT has the potential to unlock paleomagnetic information from even the most complex, crucial, or valuable recorders that current methods are unable to recover.
Oct 2021Published in Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth volume 126 issue 10. 10.1029/2021JB022364