Time Capsule Proves Oxygen 815 Million Years Ago Was Enough For Animals, Plants To Live

A time capsule contained minerals that dated 815 million years ago, revealing Earth's ancient atmosphere. The discovered time capsule showed species that eventually evolved into plants and animals.

The insides of the time capsule was made-up of rock salt from 815 million years ago. It had gas in the halite, which was also analyzed. Through the time capsule discoveries, researchers were able to find out the perfect ancient atmosphere of Earth.

The time capsule, further, housed eukaryotes. These organisms are species that evolved into the recent years' plants and animals. The eukaryotes found on the time capsule are thought to have initially diversified from 600 million years ago.

According to Professor John Parnell, chairman in geology at the University of Aberdeen and co-author of the study, said that studying the oxygen contained inside the time capsule is the first time in history. They have measured the oxygen at 10.3 to 13.4 percent of the atmosphere proving that it was enough for animals to grow, Irish Examiner reported. Professor Parnell also noted that the Earth's atmosphere today contains 20.9 percent of oxygen.

The discovery of the time capsule proved that even 215 million years before any recorded fossils were found, animals and plants already existed. This means that living organisms on Earth already occupied the planet as far as 815 million years ago. The halite time capsule also gave clues that the life even before the first-ever signs of fossils were discovered 215 million years ago, complex life forms already existed alongside simple life forms.

The halite time capsule continues to push scientists to do additional research from other halite grains. The researchers are hopeful that this may be used to unravel the Earth's mysterious origin of life.

The time capsule may possibly change the story of how Earth came to be. Many scientists believe that atmospheric oxygen served as a driving factor, but due to the recent discovery the theories can be rewritten, Gizmodo reported.