News tagged with ancient oceans

New study indicates an ancient ocean may have covered one-third of Mars

A vast ocean likely covered one-third of the surface of Mars some 3.5 billion years ago, according to a new study conducted by University of Colorado at Boulder scientists.

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Jun 13, 2010 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (26) | comments 4 | with audio podcast

Thawing permafrost 50 million years ago led to extreme global warming events

In a new study reported in Nature, climate scientist Rob DeConto of the University of Massachusetts Amherst and colleagues elsewhere propose a simple new mechanism to explain the source of carbon that fed a ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Apr 04, 2012 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (28) | comments 47 | with audio podcast

Early Earth absorbed more sunlight -- no extreme greenhouse needed to keep water wet

Four billion years ago, our then stripling sun radiated only 70 to 75 percent as much energy as it does today. Other things on Earth being equal, with so little energy reaching the planet's surface, all water ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Apr 06, 2010 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (12) | comments 5 | with audio podcast

Scientists link ocean acidification to prehistoric mass extinction

(PhysOrg.com) -- New evidence gleaned by analyzing calcium embedded in Chinese limestone suggests that volcanoes, which spewed massive amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere for a million years, caused the biggest ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Apr 27, 2010 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (13) | comments 10 | with audio podcast

Earth's early ocean cooled more than a billion years earlier than thought (w/ Video)

(PhysOrg.com) -- The scalding-hot sea that supposedly covered the early Earth may in fact never have existed, according to a new study by Stanford University researchers who analyzed isotope ratios in 3.4 ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Nov 11, 2009 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (12) | comments 1

New technique unlocks secrets of ancient ocean

Earth's largest mass extinction event, the end-Permian mass extinction, occurred some 252 million years ago. An estimated 90 percent of Earth's marine life was eradicated. To better understand the cause of ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Oct 11, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (10) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Geologists Study Historic Patterns of Climate Change

(PhysOrg.com) -- University of Cincinnati geologist Tom Lowell is part of a team studying the effects of melting ancient glaciers. The research has implications for global warming, as published this week in ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Apr 30, 2010 | popularity 3.6 / 5 (13) | comments 4 | with audio podcast

Sediment yields climate record for past half-million years

Researchers here have used sediment from the deep ocean bottom to reconstruct a record of ancient climate that dates back more than the last half-million years.

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Jun 15, 2009 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (10) | comments 1

Ancient oceans offer new insight into the origins of animal life

(PhysOrg.com) -- Analysis of a rock type found only in the world's oldest oceans has shed new light on how large animals first got a foothold on the Earth.

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Sep 09, 2009 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (10) | comments 1

Meteorite bombardment may have made Earth more habitable

(PhysOrg.com) -- Large bombardments of meteorites approximately four billion years ago could have helped to make the early Earth and Mars more habitable for life by modifying their atmospheres, suggests the ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Jun 01, 2009 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (7) | comments 3

Mars Express radar gives strong evidence for former Mars ocean

(PhysOrg.com) -- ESA's Mars Express has returned strong evidence for an ocean once covering part of Mars. Using radar, it has detected sediments reminiscent of an ocean floor within the boundaries of previously ...

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Feb 07, 2012 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (7) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Reservoirs of ancient lava shaped Earth

Geological history has periodically featured giant lava eruptions that coat large swaths of land or ocean floor with basaltic lava, which hardens into rock formations called flood basalt. New research from Matthew Jackson ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Jul 27, 2011 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (6) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Research group finds ancient deep sea mud volcano as possible site for origin of life

(PhysOrg.com) -- An international consortium of scientists and researchers has been studying some ancient rocks found on the southwestern coast of Greenland. They believe the rocks were once part of a deep ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Oct 18, 2011 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (5) | comments 2 | with audio podcast weblog

Plankton key to origin of Earth's first breathable atmosphere

Researchers studying the origin of Earth's first breathable atmosphere have zeroed in on the major role played by some very unassuming creatures: plankton.

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Feb 21, 2011 | popularity 4 / 5 (5) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

New picture of ancient ocean chemistry argues for chemically layered water

A research team led by biogeochemists at the University of California, Riverside has developed a detailed and dynamic three-dimensional model of Earth's early ocean chemistry that can significantly advance ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Feb 11, 2010 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 0 | with audio podcast