Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest sci-tech news updates. By 4.35 billion years ago, Earth might have cooled down enough for the first crust to form and life to emerge.

AP Research from two decades ago suggested the rocks could be 4.3 billion years old, placing them in the earliest period of Earth’s history. AP ...

Mars has a cold, desert-like climate with a thin atmosphere that supports extreme temperature variations, from highs of 68 °F ...

Since the planet Earth formed roughly 4.5 billion years ago, this puts the rocks within a few hundred million years of our planet’s earliest day–somewhat close in geological time.

It’s the only rock determined to be from the first of four geological eons in our planet’s history: the Hadean, which began 4.6 billion years ago when the world was hot, turbulent and hell-like.

By 4.35 billion years ago, Earth might have cooled down enough for the first crust to form and life to emerge. However, very little is known about this early chapter in Earth's history, as rocks ...

The map locates the Nuvvuagittuq Greenstone Belt in Canada, home to some of the oldest rocks on Earth. Earth formed about 4.5 billion years ago from a collapsing cloud of dust and gas, soon after ...

The Hadean Eon is the first period in the geological timescale, spanning from Earth’s formation 4.6 billion years ago and ending around 4.03 billion years ago.