Evidence of ancient life on Earth is tough to track down, but a group of scientists believe they’ve managed to find some of the oldest. Using machine learning, they’ve estimated that the oldest ...

New evidence from rocks, molecules and machine learning is forcing scientists to redraw the opening chapters of Earth’s story, pushing the first stirrings of biology far closer to the planet’s violent ...

Earth’s Ediacaran Period, roughly 630 to 540 million years ago, has always been something of a magnetic minefield for scientists. During earlier and later time periods, tectonic plates kept a steady ...

A rock core clock reveals how life recovered after Earth's greatest mass extinction and what drove that process.

There are many open questions about how our planet formed 4.55 billion years ago: When did plate tectonics start? When did the Earth's mantle begin to vigorously circulate in a process called ...

The history of Earth is written on the great tablets of tectonic plates. The motions of plates shaped land masses, formed oceans, and created the varied climates and habitats that set the stage for ...