Origin & Evolution of Life: October 2015

UCLA geochemists have found evidence that life likely existed on Earth at least 4.1 billion years ago -- 300 million years earlier than previous research suggested.

Inspired by previous work on chemistry's 'water problem' and 'asphalt problem,' a team of researchers has provided new insight into the conditions in which nucleosides combine with phosphate to form nucleoside phosphates, a key set of molecules found in RNA.

Five times in Earth's history mass extinction events have wiped out up to 90 percent of global life.