Oldest fossil
Last updated: October 13, 2017 at 0:58 am
3.7 billion years – Small humps of mostly aquatic bacteria known as stromatolites were found in rocks in the Isua Greenstone Belt, in Greenland, in 2011. They were formed by successive layers of cyanobacteria, a single-celled photosynthesizing microbe that lives in shallow water.
SOURCE:
Wade, Nicholas (31 August 2016). World’s Oldest Fossils Found in Greenland. New York Times.
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Jeffrey Gallant is the Editor-in-Chief and Records Keeper of the Diving Almanac. He is also a contributing editor of DIVER Magazine, and the scientific director of the Greenland Shark and Elasmobranch Education and Research Group (GEERG). Jeffrey started diving in 1982.