Oldest evidence of photosynthesis
By Paul Rincon

Scientists claim to have found the oldest evidence of photosynthesis - the
most important chemical reaction on Earth - in 3.7 billion-year-old rocks.
Photosynthesis is the process by which plants, algae and certain bacteria
convert sunlight to chemical energy.

Danish researchers say rocks from Greenland show life-forms were using the
process about one billion years earlier than has previously been shown.

Details of the research are published in Earth and Planetary Science
Letters.

Professor Minik Rosing and Professor Robert Frei, both of the University of
Copenhagen, Denmark, analysed ancient seafloor sediments in Isua, Greenland,
where they had previously found the earliest evidence of life on Earth.

"What this demonstrates is that the Earth had a functioning biosphere before
3.7 billion years ago," Professor Rosing told BBC News Online.

Read the rest at BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3321819.stm

Roger Buik at
http://www.es.usyd.edu.au/geology/people/staff/buick/buick.html

Posted by
Robert Karl Stonjek.
---
þ RIMEGate(tm)/RGXPost V1.14 at BBSWORLD * Info{at}bbsworld.com

---
 * RIMEGate(tm)V10.2áÿ* RelayNet(tm) NNTP Gateway * MoonDog BBS
 * RgateImp.MoonDog.BBS at 12/19/03 6:17:31 AM