/ en-us Â鶹ÒùÔº internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Â鶹ÒùÔºics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. We need two ingredients for life to start on a planet: dry land and (fresh) water. Strictly, the water doesn't have to be fresh, but fresh water can only occur on dry land. /news/2024-06-fresh-key-conditions-life-earth.html Earth Sciences Sat, 08 Jun 2024 15:00:01 EDT news636724736 New Curtin-led research has found evidence that fresh water on Earth, which is essential for life, appeared about 4 billion years ago—5 hundred million years earlier than previously thought. /news/2024-06-fresh-earliest-evidence-life-freshwater.html Earth Sciences Mon, 03 Jun 2024 11:00:01 EDT news636622862 Scientists led by Michael Ackerson, a research geologist at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, provide new evidence that modern plate tectonics, a defining feature of Earth and its unique ability to support life, emerged roughly 3.6 billion years ago. /news/2021-05-earth-oldest-minerals-date-onset.html Earth Sciences Fri, 14 May 2021 12:16:39 EDT news540213391 Microscopic minerals excavated from an ancient outcrop of Jack Hills, in Western Australia, have been the subject of intense geological study, as they seem to bear traces of the Earth's magnetic field reaching as far back as 4.2 billion years ago. That's almost 1 billion years earlier than when the magnetic field was previously thought to originate, and nearly back to the time when the planet itself was formed. /news/2020-04-magnetic-field-billion-years-debate.html Earth Sciences Wed, 08 Apr 2020 14:00:07 EDT news505550039 Many accounts at present support the presence of liquid water on Mars, where hydrated minerals testify to past processes of aqueous weathering in Martian meteorites such as NWA 7533/7034. Planetary scientists aim to estimate the timing of weathering on the Martian crust to help understand its evolution, the availability of liquid water and habitability on Mars. In a recent study, Martin Guitreau and Jessica Flahaut at the University of Manchester, U.K., and the National Center for Scientific Research in France, presented a new method based on U-Th-Pb (Uranium-Thorium-Lead) isotope dating systems. Using the technique, Guitreau and Flahaut investigated if Zircon crystals underwent low-temperature aqueous alteration, similar to observations with Hadean-aged detrital crystals from Western Australia. /news/2019-06-low-temperature-aqueous-martian-zircon-late.html Condensed Matter Wed, 26 Jun 2019 09:30:06 EDT news480671337 A combined team of researchers from the University of Cambridge and the University of California has found evidence that casts doubt on the use of zircon crystals as evidence of early development of the Earth's magnetic field. In their paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the group describes testing they conducted on the crystals and what they found. /news/2019-01-zircon-crystals-evidence-early-magnetic.html Earth Sciences Thu, 03 Jan 2019 11:30:01 EST news465723594 Scientists at The Australian National University (ANU) say the early Earth was likely to be barren, flat and almost entirely under water with a few small islands, following their analysis of tiny mineral grains as old as 4.4 billion years. /news/2017-05-earth-barren-flat-billion-years.html Earth Sciences Mon, 08 May 2017 11:00:06 EDT news413456971 Since 2010, the best estimate of the age of Earth's magnetic field has been 3.45 billion years. But now a researcher responsible for that finding has new data showing the magnetic field is far older. /news/2015-07-earth-magnetic-shield-older-previously.html Space Exploration Thu, 30 Jul 2015 14:00:03 EDT news357475677 With the help of a tiny fragment of zircon extracted from a remote rock outcrop in Australia, the picture of how our planet became habitable to life about 4.4 billion years ago is coming into sharper focus. /news/2014-02-oldest-bit-crust-firms-idea.html Earth Sciences Sun, 23 Feb 2014 13:00:45 EST news312293824 As is well known, the Earth is about 4.6 billion years old. No rocks exist, however, that are older than about 3.8 billion years. A sedimentary rock section in the Jack Hills of western Australia, more than 3 billion years old, contains within it zircons that were eroded from rocks as old as about 4.3 billion years, making these zircons, called Jack Hills zircons, the oldest recorded geological material on the planet. /news/2013-12-diamonds-earth-oldest-zircons-laboratory.html Earth Sciences Wed, 18 Dec 2013 17:12:22 EST news306609135 A new analysis of ancient minerals called zircons suggests that a harsh climate may have scoured and possibly even destroyed the surface of the Earth's earliest continents. /news/2008-06-ancient-mineral-early-earth-climate.html Earth Sciences Fri, 13 Jun 2008 13:44:41 EDT news132583481 A surprising new study by an international team of researchers has concluded Earth's continents most likely were in place soon after the planet was formed, overturning a long-held theory that the early planet was either moon-like or dominated by oceans. /news/2005-11-early-earth-livable-continents.html Mon, 21 Nov 2005 05:24:56 EST news8341