/data/photo/2023/06/10/64844c4da29b2.png?fit=%2C&ssl=1 "Discovery of the Protosterol Biota: Ecosystems of Early Earth Life")
KOMPAS.com – Molecular traces found in ancient rocks 1.64 billion years old reveal ecosystems of early Earth life.
The traces come from organisms that dominated life on Earth, in a world lacking in oxygen, thousands of years before the appearance of plants, animals and fungi.
Also read: Being One of the Most Ferocious Predators on Earth, What’s T. Rex’s Favorite Prey?
The discovery of this organism stems from a study led by paleobiogeochemists Jochen Brocks and Benjamin Nettersheim of the Australian National University in Australia, who collectively named these organisms the protosterol biota.
The first predator on Earth
Interestingly, citing Science Alert, Saturday (10/6/2023) this organism could become the world’s earliest predator.
They fed on the microbes that were abundant in the oceans of the time and are also apparently the ancestors of all eukaryotic life (organisms whose cells contain a nucleus) on Earth.
Also read: What Are the Oldest Pterosaur Fossils, 107 Million Years Old?
This eukaryotic life is all the plants, animals, fungi that are around us now, including humans.
“These ancient creatures detected in rocks that are 1.6 billion years old are abundant in marine ecosystems around the world and probably formed ecosystems for most of Earth’s history,” said Nettersheim.
Paleobiologists have long searched for early eukaryotic life, but the identification of ancient organisms has been the most challenging.
Since it has been over a billion years since they lived, any traces they may have left behind are likely to be highly degraded and difficult to diagnose.
The discovery of the world’s first predator
But finally researchers managed to make discoveries in rocks in the Barney Creek Formation in Australia.
They looked specifically for steroids, an early eukaryote biomarker first predicted by Nobel laureate biochemist Konrad Bloch in 1994, because almost all eukaryotes can synthesize steroids.
Also read: Experts Find Fossils of the Earliest Predator Animals, Like What?
This discovery suggests that this eukaryote biomarker has been hiding in plain sight all along, although what kind of creature that produced it is still unknown, as fossils of the creature itself have yet to be found.
However, researchers believe that protosterol biota organisms are larger and more complex than bacteria, and thrive on them as the next link in the food web.
“We believe they were probably the first predators on Earth, hunting and devouring bacteria,” said Brocks.
further traces left by these creatures stopped appearing in the fossil record about 800 million years ago.
Also read: What Did the Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun Look Like?
After that point, algae and fungus started to appear. Meanwhile, the first animals are thought to have appeared around 700 or 600 million years ago.
The decline in the protosterol biota and the emergence of other organisms is known as the Tonian Transform, and it is one of the most profound changes Earth’s ecology underwent, enabling the emergence of modern eukaryotes.
This finding also allows us to trace back human history to a more distant future than before.
Research published in Nature.
Get updates featured news and breaking news every day from Kompas.com. Let’s join the Telegram group “Kompas.com News Update”, how to click the link https://t.me/kompascomupdate, then join. You must first install the Telegram application on your cellphone.
2023-06-11 01:00:00
#Trex #Predator #Earth #Kompas.com
