Were dinosaurs doomed before the asteroid hit?
Scientists analyzed a rock layer in New Mexico dating to the end of the dinosaur era and found that dinosaurs in the south remained diverse…
Category: What happened in Earth’s past?
What was the Earth like a long time ago? What have archaeologists found? What was it like before life started? How did life come to be?
The history of tsunami-causing earthquakes in Japan
Researchers pieced together clues from seismic data and sediment samples to unravel the history of tsunami-causing earthquakes in the Japan…
Is Earth’s water why intelligent life evolved here?
A Columbia University scientist argued that the existence of humans provides strong evidence that intelligent life is more likely to evolve…
Plants changed the chemistry of magmas
Researchers used isotopes in magmatic minerals to demonstrate that continental magmas altered globally around 450 million years ago…
How did land plants change rivers?
Scientists studied meandering rivers across the globe to establish how they responded to the evolution of land plants.
Does the Arctic Ocean regulate or amplify global warming?
Researchers found that interactions between methane gas and seawater affected greenhouse gas emissions from the Arctic Ocean during a past…
Magma rapidly rises to Earth’s surface as Africa splits in two
Researchers analyzed timescales preserved in crystal growth zones and found that magma beneath Ethiopia rises dozens of miles to the surface…
Can 300-year-old Antarctic microbes help us understand climate change?
Researchers demonstrated that microbial DNA from a 300-year-old ice core can help track how microbes respond to global change.
Carbon feedbacks 56 million years ago similar to today
Geologists simulated the chemistry of Earth's past oceans and atmosphere using mineral data from the ancient seafloor. They found a…
When did freshwater appear on Earth?
Geologists found chemical ratios in ancient minerals that suggested Earth had freshwater 550 million years after it formed.