{"id":8250,"date":"2017-03-05T12:23:13","date_gmt":"2017-03-05T19:23:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/BigJimIndustries.com\/wordpress\/?p=8250"},"modified":"2017-03-03T12:27:33","modified_gmt":"2017-03-03T19:27:33","slug":"life-keeps-getting-older","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/2017\/03\/05\/life-keeps-getting-older\/","title":{"rendered":"Life Keeps Getting Older"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/article\/oldest-microfossils-suggest-life-thrived-earth-about-4-billion-years-ago\" target=\"_blank\"><em>from Science News<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<h1>Oldest microfossils suggest life thrived on Earth about 4 billion years ago<\/h1>\n<p><strong>Ancient microbes were spewed from deep-sea hydrothermal vents, study claims<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>BY <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/author\/meghan-rosen\" target=\"_blank\">MEGHAN ROSEN<\/a><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" title=\"SIGNS OF LIFE \u00a0In rocks left over from ancient hydrothermal vents, these microscopic tubes of hematite, an ore of iron, may be remnants of early microbes. ~~ M. Dodd\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/sites\/default\/files\/2017\/02\/main\/articles\/022817_MR_oldest-fossil_main.jpg\" alt=\"hematite\" width=\"480\" \/><em><strong>SIGNS OF LIFE \u00a0<\/strong>In rocks left over from ancient hydrothermal vents, these microscopic tubes of hematite, an ore of iron, may be remnants of early microbes. \/ M. DODD<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Tiny, iron-rich fossils exhumed from the depths of an ancient ocean could reveal the cradle of life.<\/p>\n<p>These micrometer-scale structures are probably\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/nature.com\/articles\/doi:10.1038\/nature21377\" target=\"_blank\">remnants of microorganisms that once lived amidst ancient hydrothermal vents<\/a>, researchers suggest March 1 in\u00a0<em>Nature<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn a nutshell, what we\u2019ve found are the oldest microfossils on Earth,\u201d says study coauthor Matthew Dodd, a biogeochemist at University College London. The rocks that hold the fossils came from Quebec and date to somewhere between 4.28 billion and 3.77 billion years old \u2014 when Earth was still a baby. The next oldest microfossils reported are just under 3.5 billion years old, though their validity has been debated (<em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/article\/life%E2%80%99s-early-traces\" target=\"_blank\">SN: 2\/8\/14, p.16<\/a><\/em>).<\/p>\n<p>If Dodd\u2019s structures truly are remnants of microbes, \u201cit\u2019s fantastic. I love it,\u201d says astrobiologist Martin Van Kranendonk of the University of New South Wales in Sydney. But he\u2019s not convinced. In fact, he says, \u201cthere\u2019s just not definitive proof that any of the textures or the minerals or features they have is unique of life.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[ <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/article\/oldest-microfossils-suggest-life-thrived-earth-about-4-billion-years-ago\" target=\"_blank\">click to continue reading at Science News<\/a> ]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>from Science News Oldest microfossils suggest life thrived on Earth about 4 billion years ago Ancient microbes were spewed from deep-sea hydrothermal vents, study claims BY MEGHAN ROSEN SIGNS OF LIFE \u00a0In rocks left over from ancient hydrothermal vents, these microscopic tubes of hematite, an ore of iron, may be remnants of early microbes. \/ [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8250","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-weirdness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8250\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}