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    Formation of The Earth: Information Sheet No

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    Victor Navarro Chilet
    The document summarizes important stages of geological time and the evolution of life on Earth. It describes: 1) The formation of the Earth 4.56 billion years ago from a collapsing cloud of gas and dust, and the early bombardment period. 2) The emergence of the first life forms - bacteria - around 4 billion years ago, even with an atmosphere composed of toxic gases like methane and ammonia. 3) The rise of oxygen-producing cyanobacteria which enabled more complex animal and plant life, as well as the evolution of fish, amphibians, insects and eventually dinosaurs.

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    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd

    Formation of The Earth: Information Sheet No

    Uploaded by

    Victor Navarro Chilet
    26 views1 page
    The document summarizes important stages of geological time and the evolution of life on Earth. It describes: 1) The formation of the Earth 4.56 billion years ago from a collapsing cloud of gas and dust, and the early bombardment period. 2) The emergence of the first life forms - bacteria - around 4 billion years ago, even with an atmosphere composed of toxic gases like methane and ammonia. 3) The rise of oxygen-producing cyanobacteria which enabled more complex animal and plant life, as well as the evolution of fish, amphibians, insects and eventually dinosaurs.

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    Geology

    Original Title

    EARTH

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    The document summarizes important stages of geological time and the evolution of life on Earth. It describes: 1) The formation of the Earth 4.56 billion years ago from a collapsing cloud of gas and dust, and the early bombardment period. 2) The emergence of the first life forms - bacteria - around 4 billion years ago, even with an atmosphere composed of toxic gases like methane and ammonia. 3) The rise of oxygen-producing cyanobacteria which enabled more complex animal and plant life, as well as the evolution of fish, amphibians, insects and eventually dinosaurs.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    26 views1 page

    Formation of The Earth: Information Sheet No

    Uploaded by

    Victor Navarro Chilet
    The document summarizes important stages of geological time and the evolution of life on Earth. It describes: 1) The formation of the Earth 4.56 billion years ago from a collapsing cloud of gas and dust, and the early bombardment period. 2) The emergence of the first life forms - bacteria - around 4 billion years ago, even with an atmosphere composed of toxic gases like methane and ammonia. 3) The rise of oxygen-producing cyanobacteria which enabled more complex animal and plant life, as well as the evolution of fish, amphibians, insects and eventually dinosaurs.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    of 1

    A1

    section Module
    ELEMENTS OF GEOLOGY
    Understanding important stages of geological time

    Information
    Formation of the Earth
    Sheet No

    1
    In human terms, the age of the Earth is
    immense. The Earth and solar system were
    formed 4,560 million years ago. It all began
    when an interstellar cloud (nebula) of gas and
    dust began to collapse. This collapse may have
    been triggered by a shockwave from a nearby
    supernova or star explosion.
    Collisions of dust particles in the cloud built up
    small asteroids and eventually protoplanets. One
    of those protoplanets was Earth. The proto-
    Earth was molten and was subject to frequent
    bombardment by comets, asteroids, and other
    planetary debris. At one stage a large asteroid
    struck the proto-Earth. The debris, ejected into
    space after the impact, gradually coalesced to
    form the Moon.

    The beginning of life on Earth Evolution


    The atmosphere of the early Earth was Oxygen eventually built up to its present levels,
    composed of gases such as sulphur dioxide, generating the ozone shield that screens out
    nitrous oxide, methane and ammonia. This is a UV radiation and allows complex forms of
    similar gas mix to that produced by volcanoes. life to live on land. Fish, amphibians, insects
    If the Earth was still surrounded by this gas mix and reptiles evolved. The rocks of the Burren
    today, it would be toxic to most organisms. and Cliffs of Moher formed roughly when
    amphibians and insects were evolving.
    Nonetheless, even with this toxic mix of gases
    the first life –bacteria – evolved. These bacteria Dinosaurs, which are the largest land-based
    adapted to these harsh conditions and became animals to ever have lived on Earth, evolved
    more diverse. One type of bacterium – the next. Mammals evolved shortly afterwards but
    Cyanobacteria – began to produce oxygen as a were small and insignificant at this time. A
    metabolic by-product. large meteorite impact is commonly thought to
    have killed the dinosaurs, but this is only one
    The oxygen built up in the atmosphere over
    of several contributing factors. Other factors
    time and enabled the rise of animal life. The
    were (1) the release of large amounts of toxic
    first animals to evolve were worm-like and only
    gases and dust into the Earth’s atmosphere by
    their burrows are preserved in rocks. Due to
    prolonged and catastrophic volcanic eruptions
    increasing pressure from predators, however,
    in what is now India and (2) changes in the
    animals began to secrete hard outer skeletons for
    configuration of the Earth’s continents.
    protection, e.g. shelly animals such as snails.
    The appearance of grass allowed the evolution
    and diversification of the grazing animals which
    dominate temperate and subtropical zones of
    the Earth today. The expansion of grasslands
    between 2.5 and 1 million years ago (caused by
    a change to a drier climate), and therefore of
    grassland grazing animals, may have triggered
    the evolution of humans.

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