Scientists Find Traces of Early Earth in Volcanic Rock
According to most scientists, Earth was formed between 4.5 and 4.6 billion years ago after gravity forced gas and dust left over from the creation of the Sun accreted into an object called a planetesimal. Over time, the planetesimal continued to gather more and more material and eventually became a planet. Scientists say heat produced […]
Nearby Supernovae Showered Earth and Moon With Radioactive Iron
Artist Animation of Star Explosion (NASA/JPL/Australian National University) Two new studies suggest radioactive bits of a nearby star or stars that exploded into a supernova or supernovae showered the Earth and Moon with radioactive iron a couple of million years ago. Both studies found the stellar evidence in concentrations of an isotope of iron called […]
About Half of the Water You Drink is Older than the Sun
New research reveals that as much as one half of all of Earth’s current water supply is older than the Sun. An international team of scientists led by Ilse Cleeves at the University of Michigan looked back into creation of Earth and our solar system to find out where all of the water came from. […]
New Dating System Could Reveal Secrets of Earth’s Ancient Climate
Scientists have a new tool in the quest to learn more about Earth’s ancient climate, including the mechanisms that plunged our planet into and out of ice ages. The new tool is a scientific technique called radiometric krypton dating, which recently allowed researchers to accurately determine the age of a 120,000-year-old Antarctic ice core sample. […]