The ancient history of Earth has always been hard to read. Most of the planet’s earliest crust has been lost, buried, or melted by geologic processes over billions of years. The rare remnants that ...

Earth formed about 4.6 billion years ago, during the geological eon known as the Hadean. The name “Hadean” comes from the Greek god of the underworld, reflecting the extreme heat that likely ...

Earth formed about 4.6 billion years ago, during the geological eon known as the Hadean. The name "Hadean" comes from the Greek god of the underworld, reflecting the extreme heat that likely ...

Hydrosphere interactions and alteration of the terrestrial crust likely played a critical role in shaping Earth’s surface, and in promoting prebiotic reactions leading to life, before 4.03 Ga (the ...

Conditions on Earth during its first 500 million years may have been cool enough to form oceans of water instead of being too hot for life to form. This alternate view of Earth's first geologic eon, ...