A team of scientists digging up some of the Earth’s oldest rocks has uncovered new chemical evidence that Earth’s first ...

Learn about how chemical fossils helped researchers identify one of Earth’s earliest animals: a sea sponge from the Ediacaran Period.

The group's discovery of sponge-specific chemical fossils offers strong evidence that the ancestors of demosponges were among the first animals to evolve, and that they likely did so much earlier than ...

At a certain point in Earth’s distant past, the planet’s assortment of organic molecules and compounds aligned to create the ...

Unfortunately, the fossil record only provides a very patchy picture of the early days of animals. It's particularly ...

International scientists have uncovered the oldest known phosphatic stromatoporoid sponge, dating back approximately 480 million years to the Early Ordovician, in South China. Stromatoporoid sponges ...

Tom has a Master's degree in Journalism. His editorial work covers anything from archaeology and the environment to technology and culture. Tom has a Master's degree in Journalism. His editorial work ...

The first animals to inhabit the Earth may have been sea sponges, a new study by geochemists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has suggested. In their work, the researchers linked ...

What were the first animals to appear on Earth? New research points to a surprising candidate: sea sponges. A team of ...

A team of scientists digging up some of the Earth’s oldest rocks has uncovered new chemical evidence that Earth’s first animals were likely ancestors of the modern sea sponge. The discovery relies on ...

A team of MIT geochemists has unearthed new evidence in very old rocks suggesting that some of the first animals on Earth were likely ancestors of the modern sea sponge. In a study appearing today in ...

A team of MIT geochemists has unearthed new evidence in very old rocks suggesting that some of the first animals on Earth were likely ancestors of the modern sea sponge. In a study appearing today in ...