history:h_preh1
Prehistoric times
Contents:
4.6 billion yrs ago: a collision between two neutron stars 1,000 light yrs away could have seeded 0.3% of earth's gold, platinum, uranium and actinides heavy elements via meteorites mixing with the solar systems then gas and dust clouds after the collison triggered the rapid neutron-capture process, or r-process - a series of nuclear reactions in which atomic nuclei collide with neutrons to synthesise elements heavier than iron
Hadean eon: 4,600-3,900 mya
solidification of earth's crust and the formation of earth's hot interior due to the collision of ice and metallic asteroids / meteors which caused intense heat from the collision and formed the hot earth's core giving off steam (as well as methane, carbon dioxide and nitrogen) which would form an early atmosphere before the steam condensed and falling back as rain for some 30,000 years as the surface cooled, and forming the oceans which would cover 70% of the crust. This early event probably only delivered half the water we currently have today - the rest is thought to have come from later bombardments of comets.
some believe that the prolonged ensuing metallic hailstorm ripped oxygen atoms from water producing hydrogen which formed a hydrogen rich atmosphere conducive to creating life molecules and lasting 200 million years before dissipating into space, and the free oxygen radicals then combined with iron to form ferric oxide
1)
earliest dated rock found - a 4.375 billion years old zircon from Western Australia suggests that if these crystals formed from granodiorite or tonalite — materials that are rich in water — this means that Earth cooled down really quickly suggesting there was water on earth's surface even then.
“super-deep diamonds” found in Brazil from 410-660km underground presumably within a primordial rock layer within the mantle but which does not convect with other parts of the mantle. These contain microscopic amounts of helium 3 bubbles - helium 3 is only from these primordial times whereas helium 4 can be from radioactive degradation
the sun was only 70% of its current output and apparently not hot enough itself to melt earth's ice crust, but was thought to be highly active in producing super solar flares which could have reacted with atmospheric nitrogen, carbon dioxide and methane and created the early nitrogen-based building blocks of life such as ammonia and hydrogen cyanide as well as producing large amounts of nitrous oxide which is 300x more effective than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas, which could thus explain how the early ice age melted to form the oceans.
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the moon appears to have generated it's own magnetosphere (from 4.25Ga to 2.5Ga) peaking at 4Ga when the moon was volcanically active with a tenuous atmosphere. This magnetosphere may have helped protect earth from losing its atmosphere due to solar winds.
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Cryptic epoch
Basin Groups 1-9
Nectarian epoch
Early Imbrian epoch
tectonic plates form at least 3 billion years ago, but perhaps more like 4.4 billion years ago according to recent argon gas studies
Archeozoic eon: 3,900-2,500 mya
the Late Heavy Bombardment of meteors ends c3800 mya
20-30km diameter asteroid hits Marble Bar in Western Australia c 3500 mya creating massive global earthquakes, tsunamis, tectonic plate shifts
4)
deposition of ferric oxide in the Banded Iron Formations begins c 3,800 mya
oceans rich in ferrous sulphate and carbon dioxide
atmosphere rich in methane, carbon dioxide but poor in free oxygen
sulphur oxidising and sulphate reducing bacteria
photosynthetic, oxygen producing cyanobacteria (“blue-green algae”) along with other microbes such as & archaens form microbial mats which over time become layered on a bed of calcium carbonates deposited from the carbon dioxide rich oceans (limestone) creating stromatolites start to oxygenate atmosphere
fossils of the earliest known stromatolites, about 3.5 billion years old, are to be found near Marble Bar in the Pilbara
cyanobacteria became to be the most abundant form of life on earth for some 2 billion years until the oxygen rich atmosphere combined with predator animal life forms impacted their existence
most of the oxygen released was bound up by decaying organic matter or bound to oceanic iron forming layers of iron oxide deposits on the new land masses (eg. the Kimberley Ranges of Western Australia)
Isuan era
Swazian era
Randian era
Proterozoic eon (2500 - 540 mya)
Great Oxygenation Event (GOE) 2400 mya
having exhausted the oxygen sinks in the oceans (eg. iron and organic matter), the further photosynthetic production of oxygen begins to build an oxygen rich atmosphere and reduce the carbon dioxide concentrations, and presumably wiping out much of the obligate anaerobic organisms on earth.
deposition of ferric oxide in the Banded Iron Formations which had started around 3,800 mya, cease by 1,800 mya
possible role of vulcanism and shifting of tectonic plates to release CO
2 resulting in global warming, increased rainfall and weathering and triggered a boom in cyanobacteria and carbonates and, later, carbon-13
5)
Lomagundi event 2300mya
early period - multi-celled organisms, soft-bodied invertebrates further oxygenate atmosphere
supercontinent Columbia or Nuna formed 2,000-1,800 mya then broke up 1,500-1,300 mya
supercontinent Rodinia is thought to have formed 1,000 mya and broke up into 8 continents around 600mya
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Huronian era
the free oxygen reacted with the atmospheric methane, a greenhouse gas, reducing its concentration by 700mya caused the earth to dramatically cool, and thereby triggering the Huronian glaciation, possibly the longest snowball Earth episode
global volcanic activity ejected massive amounts of carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere so that by 630 mya the greenhouse effects of the carbon dioxide rich atmosphere was able to trap sufficient heat to end this intense global glaciation
Animikean era
Riphean era
Sinian era
Phanerozoic "obvious life" eon
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Cambrian period - marine invertebrates (snails, trilobites), seaweed, lichen
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Devonian period - amphibia, insects, woody plants (ferns, scale trees, forests)
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Permian period - disappearance of many marine forms including the trilobites, rapid evolution of reptiles
supercontinent Pangea formed 300 mya and began to break up 200 mya forming the two continents, Laurasia in the northern hemisphere, and Gondwana in the southern hemisphere, separated by the Tethys Sea
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Jurassic period - more dinosaurs & reptiles, birds, moth, fly, beetle, grasshopper, termite, lobster, shrimp
Cretaceous period - marsupials, placental mammals, crabs, deciduous trees, flowering plants, disappearance of dinosaurs
Sth America begins to drift westwards away from South Africa 130 mya
East Gondwana begins to separate with India moving north 120 mya
Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event coincides with the Madagascar block breaking off from India and the eruption of the Deccan basalts which started 250,000 yrs before the asteroid impact in Mexico and continued for another 500,000 years spewing 1.5 million sq km of lava and presumably changed the global chemistry wiping out plankton and much of the rest of Cretacean life
6)
New Zealand separates from Antarctica between 130-85mya
Australia begins to separate from Antarctica 80 mya and especially around 40mya
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“age of the mammals”
Australia/Papua New Guinea continent moves further north 55mya, rotating around it's axis, and by 45mya, finally separated from Antarctica fully, allowing ocean currents to flow and cooling Antarctica while making Australia drier, while the Indian Plate collided with the Asian Plate forming the Himalayas
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Eocene epoch - horse, rhinoceros, camel, rodent, monkey, modern birds, aquatic mammals
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Papua New Guinea's northward movement into the Pacific Plate around 15 mya causes the New Guinea Highlands to form, further causing Australia to dry out due to the rain shadow effect
South America becomes connected to North America via the Isthmus of Panama, cutting off a circulation of warm water
two back-to-back nearby supernovae at end of pliocene may have tripled radiation doses for thousands of years due to a 20-fold increase in high energy muon particles striking earth and this may have increased rate of DNA mutations and thus the rate of evolution
7)
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see also:
Geologic time - an overview:
Pre-Cambrian or Cryptozoic ("hidden life") Eon:
600-6000 million yrs ago
earth formed (~6,000 million yrs ago???)
earth spun more rapidly on its axis so a day was only 4-5 hours and the moon was much closer, while giant meteorites impacted earth - the only constant environment was the deep ocean floor protected from UV radiation with little variation in temperature or pH which allowed life to begin, catalysed by minerals which would form the basis of many enzymes.
procaryotic cells (~4,650 million yrs ago)
eucaryotic cells (~3,500 million yrs ago
algae life forms (~1,500 million yrs ago)
neoproterozoic: at least 4 extreme climate reversals from global ice to hot house effect of carbon dioxide (750-580 million years ago):
the more of earth covered by ice, the more the sun's heat is reflected making the earth colder still and creating more ice
but the more ice there is, the less liquid water there is to convert carbon dioxide from volcanic activity to carbonates, thereby eventually creating a greenhouse effect which reverses an ice age if atmosphere levels reach 350x current levels, this would take tens of millions of years of volcanic activity. The greenhouse effect (further assisted by greenhouse effect of increasing water vapour) would drive surface temperatures to almost 50deg C !!
rain would then decrease atmospheric carbon dioxide levels creating seawater highly saturated in calcium carbonate
The first abundant fossils date from about 600 million years ago. The reason for the scarcity of earlier fossils is not fully understood, but in Precambrian times most species of animals probably were soft-bodied, and shells and other hard body parts suitable for preservation did not develop until the Cambrian period.
Ediacaran fauna, distinctive grouping of fossils dating from and existing only during Precambrian time. The fauna arose about 670 million years ago and is named for Australia's Ediacara hills, where it was first discovered. Such fossils were later found to be widespread. Ranging up to about 1 m (about 3 ft) long, the animals lived in shallow seas and had soft bodies that bear little resemblance to later life forms. Conceivably they may represent an early, extinct branch in the evolutionary history of animals
Mistaken Point in Newfoundland, dating from 579 to 565 million years ago
Nilpena in South Australia, dating from 555 to 550 million years ago
White Sea in Russia, dating also from 555 to 550 million years ago
Farm Swartpunt in southern Namibia, is dated at 545 million years ago and shows evidence that perhaps the newly evolving Cambrian marine animals were creating ecological stress to the Ediacaran community and perhaps were the cause of their extinction
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Three great eras of the Phanerozoic ("obvious life") eon:
Paleozoic "ancient life" era:
230-600 million yrs ago
Cambrian period:
500-600 million yrs ago
Multiple collisions between the earth's crustal plates gave rise to the first supercontinent, known as Gondwanaland.
Steptoean Positive Carbon Isotope Excursion “SPICE” event: newly exposed rock was chemically weathered by acid rain pulling carbon dioxide from the air, releasing oxygen, climate cooled, oceans cooled and allowed phytoplankton to flourish which created more oxygen through photosynthesis
Animal life was entirely confined to the seas - marine invertebrates
With the exception of the vertebrates, all the phyla of the animal kingdom existed by the end of the Cambrian times:
1st branching:
poriferans
2nd branching:
cnidarians
3rd branching:
4th branching:
5th branching:
6th branching:
brachiopods
later branching:
platyhelminths
futher branching:
7th branching:
priapulids
further branching:
The characteristic animals of the Cambrian period were the trilobites, a primitive form of arthropod, which reached their fullest development in this period and became extinct in Permian times.
Among the mollusks, the earliest snails appeared in this period, as did the cephalopod mollusks.
Flora was entirely confined to such low forms as seaweeds in the oceans and lichens on land.
Ordovician period:
425-500 million yrs ago
The predecessor of today's Atlantic Ocean began to shrink as the continents of that time drifted closer together.
The most characteristic animals of this period were the graptolites, which were small, colonial coelenterates.
The first vertebrates (marine vertebrates - primitive fishes) and the earliest corals emerged.
The largest animal was a cephalopod mollusk that had a shell about 3 m (about 10 ft) in length.
Flora resembled that of the Cambrian period.
450mya, more tectonic activity, most likely, the rise of the Appalachian Mountains, brought on a deadly ice age causing more than half of the Ordovician life forms to become extinct
Silurian period:
405-425 million yrs ago
The most important evolutionary development of this period was the first air-breathing animal, a scorpion.
The first fossil records of vascular plants, that is, land plants with conducting tissue, appeared. They were simple plants without differentiation into stem and leaf.
Devonian period:
345-405 million yrs ago
Age of the fishes
The dominant forms of animal life were fish of various types, including shark, lungfish, armored fish, and primitive forms of ganoid (hard-scaled) fish that are believed to have been the evolutionary ancestor of the amphibians.
Fossil remains found in Pennsylvania and Greenland indicate that early forms of amphibia may already have existed during the period.
Lower animal forms included coral, starfish, sponge, and trilobite.
The earliest known insect was found in Devonian rock.
The Devonian is the first period from which any considerable number of fossilized plants has been preserved.
During this period, the first woody plants developed, and before the period had closed, the land-growing forms included seed ferns, ferns, scouring rushes, and scale trees, the modern relative of which is club moss. Although the present-day equivalents of these groups are mostly small plants, they developed into treelike forms in the Devonian period.
Fossil evidence indicates that forests existed in Devonian times, and petrified stumps of certain of the larger plants from the Devonian period are 60 cm (24 in) in diameter. 1st known mini “forest” dates to 385mya in the USA. A large 365mya old forest of lycopsid trees was discovered in China.
Carboniferous period:
280-345 million yrs ago
named after the numerous coal beds which resulted from warm, humid climates which fostered lush forests in swamplands
first part of this period, known as the Mississippian in US geology:
A group of sharks, the Cestraciontes or shell-crushers, were dominant among the larger marine animals.
The predominant group of land animals was the Stegocephalia, an order of primitive, lizardlike amphibians that developed from the lungfish.
The various forms of land plants became diversified and grew larger, particularly those that grew in low-lying swampy areas.
second part - known as the Pennsylvanian in U.S. geology:
evolution of the
first reptiles, a group that developed from the amphibians and that was completely independent of a water environment.
other land animals included spiders, snails, scorpions, more than 800 species of cockroach, and the largest insect ever evolved, a species resembling the dragonfly, with a wingspread of about 74 cm (about 29 in).
The largest plants were the scale trees, the tapered trunks of which were as much as 1.8 m (6 ft) in diameter at the base and 30 cm (100 ft) high. Primitive gymnosperms known as cordaites, which had pithy stems surrounded by a woody shell, were more slender but even taller.
The first true conifers developed - advanced gymnosperms.
Permian period:
230-280 million yrs ago
The earth's land areas became welded into a single landmass that geologists call Pangaea, and in the North American region the Appalachian Mountains were formed.
The chief features of the animal life were the disappearance of many forms of marine animals and the rapid spread and evolution of the
reptiles.
In general, reptiles were of two types:
a comparatively small group of reptiles that evolved in this period, the Theriodontia, was the group from which the mammals later developed.
the predominant vegetation was composed of ferns and conifers.
it is now thought by many that the end of the Permian age 250m yrs ago (ie. before dinosaurs) was due to a
NEO which hit earth and plunged earth into darkness & freezing cold, caused volcanoes & released hydrogen sulphide gas, wiping out 90% of sea life & 80% of land life globally -
the “Great Dying” in addition to setting off the separation of the continents from the unified
Gondwana land mass a 150m yrs later. The possible sites are either:
Wilkes land region of east Antartica - 483km wide crater hidden more than 1.6km beneath the Antartic ice sheet and has a 321km wide plug of mantle - a mascon. The rift between Antartica and Australia passes directly through this crater. (published 2006)
offshore from NW of Western Australia when it was part of Pangaea resulting in the Bedout High underwater crater which is buried beneath thousands of metres of rock (discovered by oil drilling samples). The meteor is estimated to have been at least 10km diameter, leaving an impact crater of 200km diameter.
Mesozoic "middle life" era:
65-230 million yrs ago
Triassic period:
181-230 million yrs ago
the reappearance of Gondwanaland, as the supercontinent, Pangaea, split apart into northern (Laurasia) and southern (Gondwanaland) supercontinents after the early dinosaurs has established themselves.
mammals, more reptiles such as turtles
early
dinosaurs seldom exceeded 4.5m in length. The
Ingentia prima (237-201mya) is the earliest large long-necked dinosaur and weighed 7-10 tonnes. It was found in Argentina in the Late Triassic and predating the Brontosaurus by 47 million years
first ancestors of the modern bony fishes, Teleostei, made their appearance
the dominant vegetation was composed of various evergreens, such as ginko, conifer, and palm. Small scouring rushes and ferns continued to exist, but the larger members of these groups had now become completely extinct.
Jurassic period:
135-181 million yrs ago
As Gondwanaland rifted apart, the North Atlantic Ocean widened and the South Atlantic was born.
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marine reptiles included:
plesiosaurs, a group that had broad, flat bodies like those of turtles, with long necks and large flippers for swimming;
ichthyosaurs, which had scaly bodies;
primitive crocodiles
winged reptiles were represented by Pterosaurus, popularly referred to as pterodactyl
The earliest confirmed fossil identified as a bird, Archaeopteryx lithographica, is from the Late Jurassic
evolution of the insects resulted in the development of a number of the modern orders, including moth, fly, beetle, grasshopper, and termite.
Shellfish included lobster, shrimp, and ammonite, as well as the extinct group of belemnites that resembled squid and had cigar-shaped internal shells.
The flora of the Jurassic period was dominated by the cycad.
Cretaceous period:
65-135 million yrs ago
The Rocky Mountains began to rise in North America
other mammals evolved: 1st marsupials, 1st placental mammals
other shellfish evolved: crabs
several modern varieties of fish evolved
ants evolve into two main subfamilies 80-100mya in association with the rise in forest ground litter and soil associated with flowering plants (angiosperms):
fifth tribe of dinosaurs evolved such as horned dinosaurs-Triceratops
74mya, ice-free polar regions, mild climates, seas at full flood separated:
the North American continent into sections via the north-south running “Western Interior Seaway” along the east of the Rocky Mountains which covered Nebraska, Kansas, Texas & the “Hudson Seaway” separating Ontario, Qebec & Newfoundland in the south from the “Northwest territories” which were themselves separated from Greenland by the “Labrador Seaway”
North Atlantic flooded south-eastern USA up to near the Appalachian Mountains
Asia from Europe
development of deciduous and flowering plants (angiosperms):
fig, magnolia, sassafras, and poplar were among the earliest to evolve.
mid-Cretaceous fossils include remains of beech, holly, laurel, maple, oak, plane tree, and walnut.
by the end of the period, many of the modern varieties of trees and shrubs had made their appearance; they represented more than 90 percent of the known plants of the period. Some paleontologists believe that these deciduous woody plants first evolved in Jurassic times but grew only in upland areas, where conditions were unfavorable for fossil preservation.
global mass extinction event of 65-66mya when 75% of animal species died out including all the dinosaurs - this is now confirmed to be due to a
NEO asteroid of 15km diameter (100 million megatons energy) hitting Chicxulub on Mexico's Yucatan peninsula where it created a 200km crater. There had been a preceding increased volcanic activity in the Deccan which was in fact responsible for a brief warming phase 200,000 years before the mass extinction, but this had no long-term effect on life and the climate.
Cenozoic "recent life" era:
history/h_preh1.txt · Last modified: 2020/10/19 20:25 by gary1