(Image source: David Wacey/University of Western Australia)
BY TRACY PFEIFFER
ANCHOR MEGAN MURPHY
You're watching multisource science news analysis from Newsy.
A team of scientists believes they’ve discovered-- the oldest fossilized remains -- of life -- on Earth.
“A team of geologists found fossilized single-celled organisms in a remote rock formation in Western Australia. They date back 3.4 billion years, when the Earth had very little oxygen.”
The so-called “microfossils” date some 200 million years earlier than the next oldest fossilized microbes discovered. Those were found in 2010. Here’s io9 with more. (Image: David Wacey/University of Western Australia)
“The researchers suspect that the organisms they've identified were some of the planet's earliest beach bums, living between grains of sand on the Earth's earliest land masses. By carefully analyzing thin slices of rock containing the fossils ... the researchers have concluded that many of these early organisms likely survived in Earth's oxygen-free environment by feeding off sulphur-rich compounds...”
A writer for Popular Science says -- scientists suspected the organisms existed -- but it’s been difficult to track down good samples.
“Sulfur-based bacteria exist today, in places like hydrothermal vents and hot springs...but fossils of these sulfur-based life forms have been difficult to find and even more difficult to verify.”
But the finding isn’t just exciting for Earth.
Some believe -- organisms like the ones found in Australia -- could also have lived -- on our red neighbor.
An astrobiologist tells the IB Times...
“I mean, wow, we now know that sulfur-based metabolism happened very early on Earth. And early Mars had water and sulfur. It shared in many ways the environment of the early Earth... This gives us confidence that looking for these types of organisms on Mars is a good strategy.”
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