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Microbes and minerals may have set off Earth's oxygenation
- H8crilA 5y agoJust an FYI, how oxygen was produced has been roughly known for a long time: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxidation_Event https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxidation_Event This research is additional details/evidence on the evolutionary path of the suspect life forms. The Great Oxidation Event was also the largest mass extinction event in planet's history. Prior to mass availability of oxygen almost all organisms were anaerobic and oxygen was poisonous to them, just like other strong oxidants, for example chlorine or fluorine, are poisonous to us.
- SideburnsOfDoom 5y agoWhat I find fascinating is the sheer length of time of "the great rust" when oxygen was being absorbed almost as fast as it was produced and "Deposition of banded iron formation" happened. This took around 750 million years. Rust, slowly raining down onto the seabed, for three quarters of a billion years. Deep time is chilling. And also the fact that it was "banded" indicates that there may have been periodic local surges of oxygen like an "agal bloom", which would have been self-limiting when the producing organisms were poisoned by their own wastes.
- arethuza 5y ago"The mind seemed to grow giddy by looking so far back into the abyss of time..." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hutton%27s_Unconformity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hutton%27s_Unconformity
- marcosdumay 5y agoFor comparison, the animals appeared ~600 million years ago, and life took ~1 billion years to develop all the way to create photosynthesis after it appeared at all. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Earth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Earth