Facts about Fossils
- 09
Approximately 3.8 billion years old carbon-based microfossils from Western Australia's Isua Greenstone Belt represent Earth's earliest known evidence of life in the form of single-celled organisms.
- 08
Stromatolites in Western Australia's Pilbara region contain microbial fossils dating back 3.5 billion years, representing some of Earth's earliest evidence of life.
- 07
Fossilized coprolites, or ancient feces, from a Tyrannosaurus rex specimen in Saskatchewan contained bone fragments proving the dinosaur consumed live prey approximately 66 million years ago.
- 06
A 380-million-year-old fish fossil discovered in Canada called Tiktaalik possessed both fish fins and tetrapod limbs, demonstrating a crucial evolutionary transition between aquatic and land-dwelling vertebrates.
- 05
In 1912, paleontologists discovered a 150-million-year-old Archaeopteryx specimen in Germany showing clear feather impressions alongside dinosaur skeletal features, providing crucial evidence linking dinosaurs to modern birds.
- 04
Fossilized footprints in Tanzania's Laetoli formation, dated to 3.6 million years ago, show two early hominins walking upright side by side across volcanic ash.
- 03
Lucy, a 3.2 million year old Australopithecus afarensis skeleton discovered in Ethiopia in 1974, preserved 40 percent of the original bones enabling paleontologists to study early human ancestor locomotion.
- 02
Amber from the Dominican Republic has preserved mosquitoes and other insects with blood in their abdomens dating back approximately 40 million years, enabling scientists to study ancient DNA.
- 01
The oldest known fossils of multicellular animals date to approximately 575 million years ago during the Ediacaran period in Australia.