The evidence of life dating back to 2.5 billion years found by a team of researchers

KHARAGPUR: Evidence of life in India which is dating back to at least 2.5 billion years, found by a team of researchers belonging to IIT Kharagpur. According to the scientists the beginning time is known as the Great Oxidation Event, it has marked the entry of oxygen in the atmosphere of the Earth, by making life, as we know it, possible.

In Deccan the first signs of life have been found in the form of microbial cells. And it has taken the team four years of arduous work. Finally, the microbes were found at a depth of three kilometres.

Sar had said that these microorganisms, mostly bacteria, which date back to a time when the crust of the Earth was still unstable and earthquakes, punctuated with volcanic eruptions, were a routine. The Deccan Traps, where the oldest rocks (granites and basalt), are located, were the home to these first life forms, much like the Witwatersrand in South Africa, Colorado river basin in the US, and Fennoscandian Shield, Finland.

Sar has said that, “The depths of these ancient rocks do not have oxygen, water, organics or light to support life. The rock cores we dug out from three boreholes were investigated and we have been able to prove microbial existence. It is obvious that they fought extreme conditions to stay alive and multiply.”

The next phase of their research will be mainly focusing on whether the organisms are still alive. “We cannot immediately confirm that,” he explained, calling the microbes “extremophiles” because they survived extreme conditions. They are extremely intelligent bacteria and they could teach us a lesson or two about how carbon and inorganic sources can be used for survival,” he added.