HISTORY OF PLANET EARTH

How the earth was formed?

The Earth forms. The Earth is thought to have been formed about 4.6 billion years ago by collisions in the giant disc-shaped cloud of material that
also formed the Sun. Gravity slowly gathered this gas and dust together into clumps that became asteroids and small early planets called
planetesimals.
Each number represents 100 million years. So 50 would be 5000 million, or 5 billion years ago, 49 would be 4900 million, or 4.9 billion years ago,
and so on.
50 The Earth has not yet formed. Our solar system existed in a form called the "solar nebula", which contained the young sun in the center.
Surrounding the sun were huge clouds of gases, which eventually came together to form solid particles, or "cosmic dust". This cosmic dust would
eventually be drawn together by the force of gravity to form large solid bodies called planets.
46 The Earth forms. The huge clouds of gas which were part of the solar nebula have combined into solid particles of matter. There were so many of
these particles of matter that they were pulled toward each other by the force of gravity. These particles formed into large blobs of matter which
formed our 9 planets and their moons. The blob which is the third from the sun is Earth. The surface of Earth is extremely hot, covered with molten
lava lakes. Probably much too hot for any type of life, but we are not entirely sure because there is no geological record of the rocks from this time.
The surface of the Earth was constantly being hit by objects from space, called comets and planetesimals. The surface of the Earth was probably a
very violent and hostile place.
41 The surface of the Earth was still very warm, but some parts of it cooled down enough for water vapor to condense and form liquid water. Rain fell
from the sky for millions of years and covered most of the Earth with oceans. Probably still no life at this point, but the oceans contained chemicals
called nucleotides and amino acids that existed in little blobs surrounded by a membrane. These blobs are called microspheres and were not real
cells but they were able to replicate themselves and reproduce. Energy from the sun and from lightning produced chemical reactions in the air that
formed very complex molecules like nucleotides and amino acids. These are the building blocks of DNA (genes). Rain carried these complex
molecules to the oceans, forming "primordial soup", containing all ingredients necessary for life. The microspheres formed from this "primordial
soup".
39 The oldest known rocks were formed at this time. They had no traces of life. The surface of the Earth was still being hit by comets and
planetesimals.
35 The origin of life. The microspheres eventually evolved into very simple cells. The earliest fossils we have found were formed at this time. These
fossils are of very simple single celled organisms called bacteria that could feed on chemicals in the water around them. They could not use sunlight
to make their own food. This means they were "heterotrophs", meaning they eat their food, rather than producing their food. They got their energy by
converting food, such as sugar, into other substances, such as alcohol (this process is called fermentation), just as wine making microorganisms do
today in the airless environment of wine bottles. These cells were "prokaryotic", which means that they had no nucleus inside of the cell. Bacteria are
still prokaryotic cells today, three and a half billion years later! Stromatolites are layered mounds, columns, and sheet-like sedimentary rocks. They
were originally formed by the growth of layer upon layer of cyanobacteria, a single-celled photosynthesizing microbe that lives today in a wide range
of environments ranging from the shallow shelf to lakes, rivers, and even soils. Cyanobacteria are prokaryotic cells (the simplest form of modern
carbon-based life) in that they lack a DNA-packaging nucleus. Bacteria, including the photosynthetic cyanobacteria, were the only form of life on
Earth for the first 2 billion years that life existed on Earth.
34 The oceans are full of prokaryotic bacteria that do not use sunlight to make food. They did not use oxygen. Oxygen was a poison to them, and
there was little or no oxygen in the earth's atmosphere.
25 Photosynthesis evolved. This is perhaps the greatest step in the evolution of life. Photosynthesis is life's ability to absorb sunlight and use the
energy from it to make food from the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Organisms that can make their own food are called heterotrophic. The
oceans very quickly filled up with bacteria that could perform photosynthesis (called cyanobacteria, or blue-green bacteria). One of the waste
products of photosynthesis is oxygen. This is when the atmosphere first started to fill up with oxygen.
24 The oceans were filled with photosynthesizing bacteria, which were producing oxygen. Oxygen was becoming more abundant all the time.
20 Respiration evolved. Enough oxygen had built up that organisms evolved which could not only tolerate it, but use it as an important resource.
Organisms evolved that could use oxygen to help convert food into energy. This process is called respiration (remember, fermentation is the process
of converting food into energy without using oxygen).
19 Same. The oceans quickly filled up with organisms that could use oxygen to make energy.
18 Eukaryotic cells evolved. This is another of the "really big" steps in the evolution of life. Until this point, all organisms were bacteria that were
prokaryotic (without a nucleus). It is thought that there were different types of these prokaryotic bacteria living together, one inside of the other,
helping each other survive (this is called symbiosis). Eventually, they lived together so long that they lost the ability to live apart. The ones that lived

inside the others became mitochondria. Mitochondria are the parts inside of all eukaryotic cells where respiration takes place (respiration is using
oxygen and food to make energy). It is thought that other cell parts evolved in the same way, from partnerships between large and small bacteria.
Cells that have these smaller parts inside of them are called eukaryotic. These first eukaryotic cells were the basis for all plant cells, animal cells,
fungi cells, and protoctista cells. Animals would never have evolved at all without eukaryotic cells.
17 Same. Single celled eukaryotic organisms of all types evolved and filled up the oceans.
7 The first animals evolved. The first known multicelled eukaryotic animal fossils formed at this time. These evolved from "colonies" of single-celled
organisms. At this point the animals were small and simple (metazoans, segmented worms, coelenterates, arthropods) but would eventually evolve
into all of the larger, more complex animals.
6 At this point there was a sudden "burst" of evolution, often called the Cambrian explosion, in which many, many types of invertebrate animals
evolved in the oceans. The oceans were teaming with animals that had hard shells and therefore formed fossils when they died. Many of these
fossils, such as trilobites and brachiopods, you would recognize as similar to animals alive today. Oxygen in the atmosphere reached 2 percent at
this point.
5 The first fish evolved. The oceans, however were still dominated by many types of invertebrate animals.
4 Because of the huge build-up of oxygen in the atmosphere, a layer of ozone was formed in the upper atmosphere (ozone is molecules of 3 oxygen
atoms each). This ozone layer blocks the dangerous ultraviolet rays of the sun. Until this time, it was nearly impossible for organisms to exist out of
the water because they would be killed by the ultraviolet rays. So the ozone layer, along with the abundance of atmospheric oxygen (molecules of 2
oxygen atoms each) made it possible for life forms to evolve on land. Even though the ozone layer started long before this, this is the point at which
there was enough ozone to allow life on land.
Oxygen in the atmosphere reached 20 percent at this point.
The first plants evolved. The first land plants were very simple, but they existed on land before animals did. The first land plants were like mosses
you see today.
3 The "age of fishes." The oceans became filled with a variety of different types of fish. The first fishes with jaws evolved.
The first amphibians evolved. They were similar to some of the salamanders we see today.
The first insects evolved.
The moving continents came together and formed a huge land mass called Pangea.
2 The first reptiles evolved, and by the end of this period, dinosaurs had evolved.
Warm humid conditions resulted in huge forests of primitive land plants, which later formed the deposits of coal that we use today.
Mammal-like reptiles evolved.
Oxygen in the atmosphere reached the level that it as at today.
The continents that made up Pangea started moving apart.
1 The "age of dinosaurs". The land environments were dominated by many types of very large dinosaurs.
The first flowering plants (angiosperms) evolved.
The first mammals evolved.
The first birds evolved from small tyrannosaur-like dinosaurs.
0 Flowering plants (angiosperms) became very abundant on land.
Dinosaurs were very abundant until 65 million years ago, when they "suddenly" became extinct. This was possibly related to the impact of a large
meteor.
With the extinction of dinosaurs, mammals became very abundant in land environments.

At the very end of this period (about 3 million years ago) the first human-like mammals evolved (Australiopithicus, or "Lucy"). Then, at about 50,000
years ago, the first real humans evolved (Homo sapiens).

Evolutionists often speak of missing links. They say that the bridge between man and the apes is the
"missing link," the hypothetical ape-like ancestor of both. But there are supposed missing links all over the
evolutionary tree. For instance, dogs and bears are thought to be evolutionary cousins, related to each
other through a missing link. The same could be said for every other stop on the tree. All of the animal
types are thought to have arisen by the transformation of some other animal type, and at each branching
node is a missing link, and between the node and the modern form are many more.