Geochemistry - Archaeology News

Analysis of fossil tooth brings to light earliest humans from southern Africa

July 14, 2022

Fossil tooth analysis by Southern Cross University geochemist Dr. Renaud Joannes-Boyau has played a central role in an international collaboration that has properly identified the earliest humans. Dr Renaud Joannes-Boyau with a Homo Naledi tooth [Credit: Southern Cross University] The new study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, demonstrates that…

Africa, Anthropology, Early Humans, Fossils, Geochemistry, Palaeobiology, South Africa

Diverse life forms may have evolved earlier than previously thought

April 13, 2022

Diverse microbial life existed on Earth at least 3.75 billion years ago, suggests a new study led by UCL researchers that challenges the conventional view of when life began. Centimeter-size pectinate-branching and parallel-aligned filaments composed of red hematite, some with twists, tubes and different kinds of hematite spheroids. These are the oldest microfossils on Earth,…

Canada, Earth Science, Fossils, Geochemistry, Geology, Palaeontology

Earth’s Inner Core: A Mixture of Solid Fe and Liquid-like Light Elements

February 10, 2022

Earth’s core, the deepest part of our planet, is characterized by extremely high pressure and temperature. It is composed of a liquid outer core and solid inner core. Earth’s interior structure and superionic inner core [Credit: IGCAS] The inner core is formed and grows due to the solidification of liquid iron at the inner core…

Earth Science, Geochemistry, Geology, Palaeontology

New role for cyanide in early Earth and search for extraterrestrial life

February 3, 2022

Today, the colourless and deadly gas cyanide is known as a fast-acting poison and a chemical weapon. Four billion years ago, however, it may have been a harbinger of life. Chemists at Scripps Research have shown for the first time how cyanide could have enabled some of the earliest metabolic reactions to create carbon-based compounds…

Astrobiology, Earth Science, Geochemistry, Molecular Biology, Palaeontology

Lessons from the Ice Age: Alpine lakes react to climate change in their ecology

January 10, 2022

Lakes in alpine locations react sensitively to climate change. Researchers led by the Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries (IGB), and the Faculty of Geosciences at Southwest Jiaotong University in Chengdu, China, have analyzed in detail the changes in a lake in the northern Tibetan highlands since the end of the last ice…

Asia, China, Climate Change, Earth Science, Geochemistry, Geology, Palaeoclimate, Palaeontology, Tibet

Weaker ocean circulation during the Ice Age led to more carbon storage in the deep sea

December 8, 2021

The movement of water masses in the ocean, its circulation, is an essential component of the global climate system. In a study recently published in the journal The distribution of oxygen in the water column is primarily determined by the vertical circulation [Credit: MARUM – Center for Marine Environmental Sciences, University of Bremen; T. Klein] As…

Climate Change, Earth Science, Geochemistry, Geology, Oceans, Palaeoclimate, Palaeontology

New research explains Earth’s peculiar chemical composition

November 29, 2021

Earth’s surface environment hosts large reservoirs of hydrogen (H, mainly in the form of water, H2O), nitrogen (in atmospheric N2) and carbon (mainly in carbonate rocks). H, N and C are sometimes called “volatile” elements, or simply “volatiles,” by geoscientists because many of the simple compounds they form are gases at standard temperature and pressure….

Astrobiology, Earth Science, Geochemistry, Geology, Palaeontology

Study reveals the key role of the reactor surface in the famous Miller’s experiment on the molecular origin of life

November 2, 2021

A team of researchers from the CSIC and the University of Tuscia (Italy) has demonstrated the role that glass played in the historical experiment carried out by Stanley Miller in 1952 to simulate the conditions that would have given rise to life on the early Earth. The results, published in New ideas about the Hadean…

Biochemistry, Earth Science, Geochemistry, Molecular Biology, Origin of Life, Palaeontology

Earliest forest fires evidence of ancient tree expansion

May 12, 2021

The Earth’s first forest fires appear to have occurred earlier than previously thought, pointing out a link between widespread wildfires and ancient tree evolution, according to researchers at The University of Alabama. A wildfire in California [Credit: U.S. Bureau of Land Management] Although small wildfires of primordial vascular plants without leaves, branches or a developed…

Earth Science, Fossils, Geochemistry, Palaeontology