It is in this kind of event that the scientific fraternity has taken a complete reverse turn by unveiling dramatic evidence that points to a credible origin of complex life on earth 1.5 billion years earlier than people had thought. A discovery that was made in Gabon, shows that 2.1 billion years ago, environmental conditions already existed that would have supported animal life, a time way earlier than the universally accepted date of 635 million years.
Their findings, led by Professor Ernest Chi Fru of Cardiff University, have discovered evidence of the presence of life-sustaining nutrients such as oxygen and phosphorus deep into the rocks. This nutrient-rich environment, they theorize, allowed for the rise of early life forms. If his theory holds, these early organisms would have resembled slime mold, a brainless, single-cell organism that reproduces with spores, explained Chi Fru.
But the scientists are not going to have it all their way with this new theory, as there are already many skeptics. University College London’s Professor Graham Shields said although he wouldn’t dismiss the possibility of higher levels of nutrients 2.1 billion years ago, he is yet to be convinced that this increase in levels could lead to the kind of diversification needed for complex life. Shields said more evidence was needed to back up these claims.
The discovery helps to add fuel to an ongoing debate over mysterious formations found in Franceville, Gabon, about which argument has raged on whether they are indeed fossils. Chi Fru and his colleagues believe the formations suggest evidence for self-propelled life, indicating that complex life could have begun far earlier than had been thought.
To back their theory, researchers analyzed sediment cores drilled from the rock in Gabon. Its chemistry revealed signs of a “laboratory” for life created just before the formation appeared. They theorize that high levels of oxygen and phosphorus were produced by the collision of two continental plates underwater, creating volcanic activity, which then created a nutrient-rich shallow marine inland sea.
Chi Fru opined that this sheltered environment allowed photosynthesis and generated large quantities of oxygen in the water. This should therefore provide sufficient energy to grow the size of the body and sustain the more complicated behaviors observed in early, simple animal-like life forms that did come into being in the fossils from that era.
“We’re saying, look, there’s fossils here, there’s oxygen, it’s stimulated the appearance of the first complex living organisms,” Chi Fru stated. He added that this discovery helps us understand the processes that create life on Earth and ultimately where we have all come from.
While this evidence is part of an argument dividing the scientific community, it gives new insight into the time scale of the evolution of life on our planet; it could very well rewrite the history of complex life on Earth.