EARLY EARTH - INDO DAILY

Earth's water present before impact formed moon, study finds

Mar 29, 2018 (UPI)

Scientists from the United States, Britain and France studied moon rocks brought back to Earth by astronauts on the six Apollo missions and volcanic rocks retri...

Evidence for a giant flood in the central Mediterranean Sea

Mar 23, 2018 (SPX)

The flood, known as the Zanclean flood, is thought to have ended the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC), a period during which the Mediterranean Sea became partial...

Reptile with massive jaws lived in Connecticut 200 million years ago

Mar 23, 2018 (UPI)

Even compared to today's diversity of reptiles, the ancient lizard-like species boasted an impressively large bite -- especially considering the reptile' small ...

Genetic analysis uncovers the evolutionary origin of vertebrate limbs

Mar 23, 2018 (SPX)

The study, published this week in Nature Genetics, demonstrates that fish, mice and likely all modern-day vertebrates share genetic elements first used to devel...

Two-billion-year-old salt rock reveals rise of oxygen in ancient atmosphere

Mar 23, 2018 (SPX)

The study by an international team of institutions including Princeton University found that the rise in oxygen that occurred about 2.3 billion years ago, known...

Pterosaurs went out with a bang, not a whimper

Mar 21, 2018 (SPX)

Pterosaurs - prehistoric reptiles popularly known as pterodactyls - were flying cousins of the dinosaurs. Soaring on skin wings supported by a single huge finge...

Are palaeontologists naming too many species?

Mar 21, 2018 (SPX)

Professor Judy Massare (SUNY College at Brockport, NY, USA) and Dean Lomax (The University of Manchester) have studied hundreds of specimens of Ichthyosaurus. A...

The early bird got to fly: Archaeopteryx was an active flyer

Mar 21, 2018 (SPX)

Was Archaeopteryx capable of flying, and if so, how? Although it is common knowledge that modern-day birds descended from extinct dinosaurs, many questions on t...

Ash from dinosaur-era volcanoes linked with shale oil, gas

Mar 14, 2018 (SPX)

That's the conclusion of a new study by Rice University geologists that appears this week in Nature Publishing's online journal Scientific Reports. "One of the ...

Fossil burrows show early origins of animal behavior

Mar 14, 2018 (SPX)

Nagoya, Japan - In the history of life on Earth, a dramatic and revolutionary change in the nature of the sea floor occurred in the early Cambrian (541-485 mill...

Experiment sheds new light on prehistoric ocean conditions

Mar 12, 2018 (SPX)

Swanner, an assistant professor of geological and atmospheric sciences, was part of an international research team including researchers from the University of ...

Photosynthesis originated a billion years earlier than we thought, study shows

Mar 08, 2018 (SPX)

The author of the study, Dr. Tanai Cardona, says the research can help to solve the controversy around when organisms started producing oxygen - something that ...

127-million-year-old baby bird fossil sheds light on avian evolution

Mar 07, 2018 (SPX)

It measures less than five centimetres - smaller than the little finger on an average human hand - and would have weighed just three ounces when it was alive. W...

Fossilized plant leaf wax provides new tool for understanding ancient climates

Mar 06, 2018 (SPX)

As the Earth's surface and atmosphere warm, the amount of moisture - water vapour - in the atmosphere will increase. Understanding the size of this increase is ...

Princeton geologists solve fossil mystery by creating 3-D 'virtual tour' through rock

Mar 06, 2018 (SPX)

With an industrial grinder and a super-high-resolution camera, Princeton geoscientists Adam Maloof and Akshay Mehra can deconstruct rock samples and create thre...

Photosynthesis emerged a billion years earlier than previously thought

Mar 06, 2018 (UPI)

Photosynthesis -- the ability to convert the sun's rays into usable energy, and in the process produce oxygen -- kickstarted early evolution, paving the way for...

Tiny bubbles of oxygen got trapped 1.6 billion years ago

Mar 05, 2018 (SPX)

The bubbles were photographed and analyzed by researchers studying early life on Earth. Microbes are of special interest: They were not only the first life form...

Ancient fossil turtle species sheds light on invasive modern relatives

Feb 28, 2018 (SPX)

Steven Jasinski, author of the new study, is a doctoral student at the University of Pennsylvania and acting curator of paleontology and geology at the State Mu...

Amphibian adapted to varied evolutionary pressures

Feb 26, 2018 (SPX)

With colleagues from Brazil, Utah State University ecologist Edmund "Butch" Brodie, Jr. reports caecilians feature greatly enlarged poison glands at each end of...

Moths in mud can uncover prehistoric secrets

Feb 26, 2018 (SPX)

"This is an exciting discovery, which will greatly increase our knowledge of prehistoric forest ecosystems," says Dr. Miguel Montoro Girona, joint-lead author o...