3.77-Billion-Year-Old Fossils Found, Could be Earliest Evidence of Life On Earth (theguardian.com)

An anonymous reader shares The Guadian report: Scientists say they have found the world's oldest fossils, thought to have formed between 3.77bn and 4.28bn years ago. Comprised of tiny tubes and filaments made of an iron oxide known as haematite, the microfossils are believed to be the remains of bacteria that once thrived underwater around hydrothermal vents, relying on chemical reactions involving iron for their energy. If correct, these fossils offer the oldest direct evidence for life on the planet. And that, the study's authors say, offers insights into the origins of life on Earth. "If these rocks do indeed turn out to be 4.28 [bn years old] then we are talking about the origins of life developing very soon after the oceans formed 4.4bn years ago," said Matthew Dodd, the first author of the research from University College, London. With iron-oxidising bacteria present even today, the findings, if correct, also highlight the success of such organisms. "They have been around for 3.8bn years at least," said the lead author Dominic Papineau, also from UCL.

Comments

Earliest evidence of life on Earth?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do we need more evidence of life on Earth? Haven't we already proven that life exists on Earth?

(Note: this is a joke)

Re:Earliest evidence of life on Earth?

[Alain Williams]

We know that there is life om Earth ... the question is: is the life on Earth intelligent ?

Re:Earliest evidence of life on Earth?

[The Raven]

I know it's a joke, but just for the sake of discussion I'd like to address it.

Finding out that life took 'only' 100 million years to appear after the formation of liquid oceans makes it a lot more likely that life (as we know it) is ubiquitous in favorable conditions. It means that if we are ever able to investigate the cosmos, we may find that most worlds that have liquid water have at least primitive life on them (rather than 'some' or 'occasional'). And there is always the possibility of life as we don't know it; life in gas giants, on neutron stars, in the gluon soup of the first moments of the cosmos (Stephen Baxter, but I can't remember which story), in the accretion disks of black holes, in the photosphere of stars.

There are so many ways that organization could form out of chaos, and that life would be invisible to us. If there was a form of life that lived in our sun's photosphere how would we tell it existed? We only recently learned that there are microbes in our upper atmosphere that is evolved to survive there permanently... and we flew through it for decades!

The more alien life is, the easier it is for us to overlook or not recognize the signs of its existence. Not only that, but the less likely we are to visit (or closely investigate) the environment it lives in because that environment is inhospitable to us.

So yeah... finding out that life evolved early on on Earth is fascinating, and it really lends weight to the possibility of life being all over the place... even where we have not tried to look.

Re:Earliest evidence of life on Earth?

[MightyMartian]

I remember reading an observation by a chemist or molecular biologist years ago that abiogenesis events might go on all the time, but the problem for any new protolife is that if it appears in an already active biosphere where a fair portion of the existing organisms are very very good at gobbling stray bits of organic material, it's not going to last long at all.

Re:Earliest evidence of life on Earth?

[PoopJuggler]

Just for the sake of completeness I would like to mention that it's possible we just got lucky and got seeded from outer space early on. All it takes is a single organism in the right place at the right time.

Re:Earliest evidence of life on Earth?

[PPH]

Earliest? Do you mean before my morning coffee?

Re:Earliest evidence of life on Earth?

[tsa]

That is not hard to come up with. What's hard to come up with is a scenario where only one of all those different early life forms on this enormous planet of ours manages to prevail very very early in the history of said planet and bethe oldest ancestor of all life on Earth as we know it today.

Re: Earliest evidence of life on Earth?

[PoopJuggler]

I don't ask proto-life what it does in its spare time, and I don't tell proto-life what I do in mine.

Huh?

[Frosty Piss]

There must be something wrong with their testing protocol, we all know that the earth is about 6,000 years old.

Re:Huh?

[radiumsoup]

why does it matter if some folks believe something that you don't believe (even if you have compelling evidence to justify your belief?) I mean, *really* matter?

Eventually there comes a point where you just accept that your loved ones have different ideas than you, but you can still choose to love them regardless. Arguing "just to be right" is something one of my in-laws does, and now he's not invited to Thanksgiving or Christmas any more, which is sad and completely unnecessary - if only he'd just pocket his confrontational attitude for a few days a year, we'd all have the same good times we had for years before he started on his insistent badgering that has ended up with him throwing literal fists at the rest of the family on more than one occasion. Cops were even called the last time (which ensured it was the last time.) And it's not like his views are out of the mainstream - other family members share his ideas, but they realize it's not beneficial to be confrontational. They even politely deflect if the conversation steers toward "that" arena.

More shocking

[Anonymous Coward]

Their DNA contained only 50% chicken.

SUBJECT REQUIRED

[beelsebob]

With life being at least 83% as old as the planet according to this result, it makes me begin to wonder "has life been on earth ever since it formed?"

That's clearly not a question we're going to answer today, but it might have drastic impacts on the drake equation if there was some requirement for life that has to happen as the planet forms.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[iggymanz]

what if that life arrived as "contamination" from elsewhere?

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[MightyMartian]

I'm not a huge fan of panspermia in general, as it seems to add an additional step to a problem, but really just pushes the question back. I can concede that it is possible that Mars, which may have been more conducive to life earlier, may have been the source of life on Earth, but until we find some evidence that life actually existed on Mars at some point, and further can show enough molecular commonality with life on Earth, I think Occam's razor suggests we have to stick for the moment with life being indigenous to Earth. That being said, even if we found life on Mars that appeared to be part of the same twin-nested hierarchy as life on Earth (in other words, we're all on the same family tree), that still wouldn't really answer the question, since it's easily conceivable that the transit could have been the other way; Earth to Mars.

What we do know right now is that some of the most ancient genes suggest these early organisms at the root of the tree of life were autotrophic and probably hung around deep sea vents in waters rich in iron and sulfates (this is the idea behind the iron-sulfur world hypothesis). While this doesn't necessarily discount Mars either, as Mars in this early era had oceans and was very likely geologically active, it still suggests to my mind that Earth is still a pretty clear contender for the source of the life we see today.

A lot will depend on whether we can find other life in the solar system. If we go to Mars or Europa and end up finding organisms that have a clear molecular relationship to life on Earth, it certainly proves the limited form of panspermia happened, whereas if it turns out there is no evident genetic relationship, then that ought to tell us life is pretty damned common in the universe, and even in conditions like the Hadean Epoch, when Earth was quite literally at points a hell, life can not only evolve but possibly even flourish.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[ScentCone]

but it might have drastic impacts on the drake equation if there was some requirement for life that has to happen as the planet forms

But that wouldn't even make sense. Because the planet, "as it was forming," was a completely life-hostile seething ball of super-heated molten stuff. Life-friendly things present at that time would have been cooked into oblivion. Things had to cool down and get wet, first.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[Gravis Zero]

it might have drastic impacts on the drake equation if there was some requirement for life that has to happen as the planet forms.

The Drake Equation allows for the possibility of exogenesis which thusly nullifies any requirements you might think to add to planets.

fl = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life at some point <-- allows for exogenesis.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[TeknoHog]

I'm not a huge fan of panspermia in general, as it seems to add an additional step to a problem, but really just pushes the question back.

Surely it's more likely that life developed at all, compared to life developing on one particular planet. I agree there's the additional probability/step of getting life from there to here, but that would balance it out to some extent.

I also wonder how similar life elsewhere turns out in case there's no panspermia. For example, the handedness of molecules in Earthly life is related to CP violation of physics, which I expect to be the same all around.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[beelsebob]

The point was that it causes that coefficient to be rather low if some specific condition is needed at some very specific time in the planet's life, rather than generally being something that can happen at any moment.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[MightyMartian]

I guess some of it depends on how much imagination you want to apply to the potential kinds of life. If we imagine that life has a few key requirements; namely some sort of universal solvent, plentiful energy, and chemistry capable of creating fairly sophisticated molecules and chains of molecules, then I think we're probably looking at the classic "organic soup" of water, complex organic compounds, or the capacity to produce them, and ready sources of energy. If that's the case, then I imagine that while the specific nature of the molecular biology; system of heredity and transcription, energy product and storage, and the other aspects of reproduction and the cellular chemical engine, will still be analogous to life on Earth. I've read that while silicon-based life might be possible, carbon remains the champion for the sheer complexity of the bonds it can produce.

If we broaden beyond that, then who knows? I remember reading 2010 and Arthur C. Clarke hypothesizing about giant organisms in the Jovian atmosphere, and thinking "Who knows, maybe?" But obviously that kind of life would be radically different in chemistry and structure from an kind of organic-based life we know.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[MightyMartian]

That describes parts of the Hadean Epoch, and in particular the early parts, but there is some evidence that even during the Hadean Epoch there was liquid water, possibly even oceans. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/..., it states that even though surface temperatures were much higher, the much higher atmospheric pressure meant that liquid water could exist. Considering some evidence that the earliest organisms were autotrophic and lived in an environment very much like existing deep sea vents, one can surmise that while this environment would be pretty damned hostile, it would still have had the critical ingredients; water, complex organic chemistry and an abundance of energy.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[argStyopa]

"it might have drastic impacts on the drake equation if there was some requirement for life that has to happen as the planet forms."

I'd have gone the opposite direction, actually. I'd say it would have drastic impact on the Drake Equation if life could form in an environment as hostile as the earth 3.87 bn years ago - iirc that was only very shortly after (we believe) water oceans formed.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[Sique]

I agree wholeheartedly, and I want to add some other arguments against panspermia.

We know that simple organic compounds form spontaneously from anorganic matter. Amino acids like lysine or nucleic acids for instance appear, if you treat a mixture of water, carbondioxide and nitrogenium with lightning. So yes, organic compounds have been found in comets or meteorids, but that's because they are quite aboundant in space and form sponaneously given the right conditions.

Yes, some of those compounds on Earth might have arrived via a cosmic impact, but it seems they were just the literal drop in an ocean of organic compounds formed on Earth itself. And an asteroid impact sets free a large amount of energy, comparable to a nuclear detonation, which means that any more complex molecules have been destroyed by the impact.

And allthough organic matter forms spontaneously from anorganic matter, and organic matter can be transported via comets and other cosmic debris, if it arrives somewhere where life might form, there is a high probability that life has already formed there, when the organic matter arrives from space, and then it's just some additional nutrient for the local life forms, but it will not be the origin of a completely new life.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[rtb61]

How long can a fossil survive ie how long would it take for every rock on a planet to be recycled. Rock to not rock and back again and again and again. What limits are there upon survivability of fossils over time, especially larger ones. The only reason larger fossil are never discovered further back in surviving rock history is because they simply did not survive the rock recycling process.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[MightyMartian]

There's enough of the ancient crust to demonstrate that there were no large complex lifeforms before 600 million to a billion years ago.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[Gravis Zero]

My point is that it can happen at any time in a planet's life because of exogenesis.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[khallow]

For example, the handedness of molecules in Earthly life is related to CP violation of physics,

I strongly doubt that. I would suggest instead that handedness is a result of it being more efficient to have key molecules of one handedness rather than both. Then it becomes random chance which handedness becomes dominant, assuming there was ever a competition in the first place rather than handedness manifesting from the beginning.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[TeknoHog]

I recall some actual papers about the CP violation effect on biological chirality, and it seems it's at least a possibility:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com...

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[iggymanz]

But there is zero evidence in the lab that amino acids self-assemble into self-replicating self-programming robots (aka organic life). What if that takes billions of years to happen by chance? As we explore space we may find that is indeed the case.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[MightyMartian]

I'd just like to add to that that one of the indirect ways we know that larger more complex multicellular lifeforms didn't involve into the last billion years is because oxygen levels didn't normalize through the Great Oxygenation Event until about a billion years ago. Oxygen is pretty darned important to most, if not all multicellular organisms, but is toxic to many anaerobic organisms, which are almost inevitably single-celled, and which would have dominated for much of Earth's history.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[Sique]

As I said: I doubt that any long compounds of amino acids or nucleic acids survive a meteor strike.

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[RockDoctor]

What do you think would remain of those papers if we discover opposite-handed life (or opposite-handed biochemical debris) on Europa?

Re:SUBJECT REQUIRED

[RockDoctor]

But there is zero evidence in the lab that amino acids self-assemble into self-replicating self-programming robots

Do try to keep within a couple of decades of the cutting edge. It is ages since self-catalysing oligonucleotides have been demonstrated in early-Earth analogues. It's not life, but it's another step in the right direction.

Re:DBAG

[Anonymous Coward]

Because then you get an entire population of ignorant clueless superstitious barbarians that elect abominations like Trump for their leaders.

If we didn't live in democraties, I would have no problem letting anyone be as clueless and moronic as they want.

Oldest evidence of life

[rossdee]

cue the John McCain jokes

Re:Oldest evidence of life

[ausekilis]

No no no... I'm pretty sure some of the fossils on the road around here pre-date McCain by at least 100M years.

Similar to what was found on Mars?

[mykepredko]

When I RTFA and saw the reference to hematite, I wondered if this is similar to possible evidence of life found on Mars: http://mars.nasa.gov/mer/scien...

Any biologists out there care to explain if this is similar or different?

If this is similar, does this provide a clue as to how life starts to evolve on a planet?

Re:Similar to what was found on Mars?

[Black Parrot]

When I RTFA and saw the reference to hematite, I wondered if this is similar to possible evidence of life found on Mars

Funny, whenever I see a reference to hematite I think of Dwarf Fortress.

Re:Similar to what was found on Mars?

[RockDoctor]

Try reading the FP instead of reading a hastily-written summary prepared by journalists who don't actually understand what they're regurgitating from the press release. There's a reason that scientists write papers, after all, rather than communicating by press release.

Personally, I take the presence of authigenic haematite as evidence that there was at least some organism in the environment increasing the oxygen activity of the system.

My dad

[Anonymous Coward]

I know someone who has a BSME from Texas A&M. He's a skeptic of human caused global climate change, will analyze and critique many things and will find problems but when it comes to the Bible, accepts it without question. He's something out of a Richard Dawkins book.

He read this book that "explained" how Noahs Ark is completely feasable and he accepts it over peer reviewed science.

It's actually kind of scary. An anology would be a grown man talking about Santa Claus like he was a real person that he shake hands with.

Re:My dad

[Registered Coward v2]

I know someone who has a BSME from Texas A&M. He's a skeptic of human caused global climate change, will analyze and critique many things and will find problems but when it comes to the Bible, accepts it without question.

Being educated doesn't mean one can't have such beliefs; in fact getting such an education, where oftentimes information that conflicts with your beliefs is introduced, will act to reinforce your beliefs. While we like to think that evidence contrary to our beliefs would cause us to reassess them; studies show that often simply makes us more firm in our beliefs; no matter if we are liberal or conservative, for example.

Re:My dad

[MightyMartian]

These people aren't all that uncommon. Michael Behe is pretty notorious, and he's a microbiologist. Of course, nailing down what exactly Behe believes is tough. His popular writings amount to "somehow something somewhere is wrong with evolution", and certainly he has never actually published anything in peer reviewed journals promoting Intelligent Design. So some categorize him as a theistic evolutionist. But then he'll apparently go to Evangelical churches and talk like he's an out and out Creationist, so it's possible that we're just dealing with the Frank Spencer phenomenon; where an expert "loans out" his credentials for money.

Re:My dad

[PPH]

will analyze and critique many things and will find problems but when it comes to the Bible, accepts it without question

The problem with such people is that their lack of cynicism often extends beyond the Bible. It would be more accurate to say that such people may analyze and critique many things within their sphere of expertise. But they can be made to accept on faith quite a bit of stuff not even in the Bible. Particularly if the source has the title of Reverend or Father.

Re:My dad

[tsa]

Our brains are too complicated for logical thinking.

Re:The scientist fantasy

[spiritplumber]

If scientists end up in Hell they will terraform it, given an eternity of time.

Lake of fire? OK.

Lake means it has shores, somewhere to colonize. Fire means a recognizable chemistry, which implies a recognizable physics, AND a fairly rapid and high-volume energy transfer from the lake to the atmosphere.

By the time scientists and engineers are done with the place (and I remind you that they have forever to do it, so it WILL get done) you won't be able to afford rent there.

https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/c...

Re:The scientist fantasy

[MightyMartian]

I can just see it now. "Satan, we've got to do something about those fucking engineers! There's a fucking Starbucks beside the River Styx. And don't get me started on Steve Jobs' latest project."

Re:DBAG

[coolmoe2]

Man without fail I never have mod points when I need them and its worse because I never want to mod up AC's.
However you are the exception to my rule.

Re:That is not possible

[gtall]

That's the problem, he believes he's telling the truth. "The Lord is my Shepard, I shall not think."

Re:DBAG

[PoopJuggler]

Republics are a form of democracy. We don't live in a Pure Democracy, but we live in a democracy.

Re:DBAG

[Anonymous Coward]

Way to completely miss the point, dude.

Ignorance, willful or woeful, is a recipie for disaster.

If you aren't sure what that means, go read up on Lysenkoism, furthered in political fear but derived from ignorant pseudoscience.

However, because I know you won't deal with the cognitive dissonance caused by having your shibboleths debunked, I put the Wikipedia definition here:

The term Lysenkoism can also be used metaphorically to describe the manipulation or distortion of the scientific process as a way to reach a predetermined conclusion as dictated by an ideological bias, often related to social or political objectives.

WTF right? Lysenko/Lysenkoism with Stalin's backing only screwed up Soviet agriculture for decades. No big deail, right? How about this: "More than 3,000 mainstream biologists were sent to prison, fired, or executed as part of a campaign instigated by Lysenko to suppress his scientific opponents. The president of the Agriculture Academy, Nikolai Vavilov, was sent to prison and died there, while scientific research in the field of genetics was effectively destroyed until the death of Stalin in 1953. Research and teaching in the fields of neurophysiology, cell biology, and many other biological disciplines was also negatively affected or banned."

In case your reading comprehension is poor, I'll paraphrase: millions suffered (food shortages, unmet medical needs) or died needlessly.

You assholes have NO FUCKING IDEA how very likely are the terrible consequences of your ignorance, nor how hard it is to rebuild after the kind of disaster you are very likely to cause.

Ignorance IS NOT strength.

Learn from history

[Tablizer]

Often scientists end up discovering natural processes that can resemble the patterns of life, both physical and chemical. Error on the side of skepticism.

Re:DBAG

[jandersen]

What is wrong with letting people believe in something they want? You guys don't have to be Aholes...

There is nothing wrong in allowing people to have their religion in peace, if they in return don't try to influence others to abandon their trust in science and logic. Unfortunately that doesn't happen - a lot of religious people not only want to be allowed to ignore fact that don't fit into their beliefs, but insist on having a right to decide what scientists can think. Respect is earned - if you want me to respect your choice of religion, then you must in return respect my choice of no religion.

Re:The scientist fantasy

[eaglesrule]

Since the topic is evolution of life on earth, if religion was an organism it would have to be of the parasitic variety that modifies host behavior to in order to reproduce itself, much like the kind of fungus that infects ant brains. There are of course many types of strains of this ephemeral brain parasite, but this AC seems to infected with the more malevolent sort that signals false imminent danger along with the behavioral modification required in order to avoid it. This seems to be the first stage in finding new hosts that are weak in cognitive and critical thinking ability and who are ripe for the mental conditioning necessary in order to continue its life cycle.

Evolution, in all its forms, truly is fascinating.

whoa...

[Lord Flipper]

Adam & Eve are gonna be pissed!