Mathematics – Logic
Scientific paper
Mar 2002
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2002natur.416...76b&link_type=abstract
Nature, Volume 416, Issue 6876, pp. 76-81 (2002).
Mathematics
Logic
112
Scientific paper
Structures resembling remarkably preserved bacterial and cyanobacterial microfossils from ~3,465-million-year-old Apex cherts of the Warrawoona Group in Western Australia currently provide the oldest morphological evidence for life on Earth and have been taken to support an early beginning for oxygen-producing photosynthesis. Eleven species of filamentous prokaryote, distinguished by shape and geometry, have been put forward as meeting the criteria required of authentic Archaean microfossils, and contrast with other microfossils dismissed as either unreliable or unreproducible. These structures are nearly a billion years older than putative cyanobacterial biomarkers, genomic arguments for cyanobacteria, an oxygenic atmosphere and any comparably diverse suite of microfossils. Here we report new research on the type and re-collected material, involving mapping, optical and electron microscopy, digital image analysis, micro-Raman spectroscopy and other geochemical techniques. We reinterpret the purported microfossil-like structure as secondary artefacts formed from amorphous graphite within multiple generations of metalliferous hydrothermal vein chert and volcanic glass. Although there is no support for primary biological morphology, a Fischer-Tropsch-type synthesis of carbon compounds and carbon isotopic fractionation is inferred for one of the oldest known hydrothermal systems on Earth.
Brasier Martin D.
Grassineau Nathalie V.
Green Owen R.
Jephcoat Andrew P.
Kleppe Annette K.
No associations
LandOfFree
Questioning the evidence for Earth's oldest fossils does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.
If you have personal experience with Questioning the evidence for Earth's oldest fossils, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Questioning the evidence for Earth's oldest fossils will most certainly appreciate the feedback.
Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-1495936