In Australia, scientist had been analyzing rocks when they discovered traces of bacteria that have been alive 3.49 billion years ago. The traces of it were found on stromatolites. Stromatolites are the evidence that there was life on our planet 3.5 billion years ago. They are layered structures that are formed in shallow water. They are formed by the trapping, binding and cementation of the sedimentary grains of microorganisms. Most of the microorganisms found are cyanobacteria. Cyanobacteria, also known as blue-green algae, have left fossil records that go as far as the Precambrian era1They are larger than most bacteria, but they are not bacteria or algae. Like algae, however, they photosynthesise2. Cyanobacteria were created because of a mutation of the purple sulphur bacteria that had chlorophyll. Their cells are preserved in a mineral replacement that is in an shapeless matric make of carbon that takes the part of the exopolysacchride investment of the colony of the cyanobacteria. 3
Evidence that bacteria existed 3.5 billion years ago is found in fossils. One example of a fossil that has evidence of the bacteria that lived and continues to live today is stromatolites or stromatoliths. Stromatolites are layered accretionary structures formed in shallow water by the trapping, binding and cementation of sedimentary grains by biofilms of microorganism, especially cyanobacteria (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromatolite). Stromatolites provide the most ancient data of life in fossils which date back more than 3.5 billion years. The oldest know fossils are the cyanobacteria (AKA: blue-green algae) are from the Archean rocks found on the western side of Australia. These fossils have been dated back all the way to 3.5 billion years. The rocks that the bacteria was found was said to be 3.3 to 3.5 billion years ago. (http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/bacteria/cyanofr.html) (http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/oldest-fossils-reveal-life-3-4-billion-years-ago-1.978460?ref=rss) These fossils included cell-like structures of all about the same size that looked like a microfossils of bacteria found that lived 2 billion years ago. They were found in clusters and chains very similar to the ones formed by bacteria today. (http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/oldest-fossils-reveal-life-3-4-billion-years-ago-1.978460?ref=rss) The rocks found in Australia are “the best-preserved sedimentary rocks we know of, the ones most likely to preserve the really tiny structures and chemicals that provide evidence for life.” (Maud Walsh, biogeologist). There are older rocks on earth but these rocks are most likely to preserve they evidence of life from 3.5 billion years ago. This is because, unlike dinosaur bones, these fossils are not petrified. They are textures on the surfaces of sandstone. Created by thick mats of bacteria that glue together sand particles. The sand stuck to the land beneath the mats can be protected from weather erosion and eventually turn into rock that can outlast the living organisms above it. (http://spittalstreet.com/?p=6436) "Fossils Found in Western Australia Could Be 3.5 Billion Years Old." SpittalStreetcom RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Sept. 2013. . "'Oldest' Fossils Reveal Life 3.4 Billion Years Ago - Technology & Science - CBC News." CBCnews. CBC/Radio Canada, n.d. Web. 26 Sept. 2013. . "Cyanobacteria: Fossil Record." Fossil Record of the Cyanobacteria. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Sept. 2013. . "Stromatolite." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 19 Sept. 2013. Web. 26 Sept. 2013. .
Biofilms of Microorganisms, especially the cyanobacteria, form a large layered structure in the shallow water(wikipedia.org). The structure is called stromatolites when it is in dome-like shape, and oncolites when it is spherical shape (ucmp.berkeley.edu). Oncolites of microorganisms are also known as the fossil records of microorganisms (wikipedia.org), and the currently oldest cyanobacteria-like fossils found are nearly 3.5 billion years old (ump.berkeley.edu). There are About 1 billion years old short chain of cyanobacteria fossils found in Bitter Springs Chert of northern Australia were very similar to the cyanobacteria living today; in fact, most fossil cyanobacteria can almost be referred to living genera(ucmp.berkeley.edu). Some Archean rock formations show microscopic similarity to modern microbial structures(wikipedia.org). J. William Schopf, paleontologist at the University of California, LA, discovered bacteria fossils in Apec chert - Ancient rocks in the northern parts of West Australia. He published his result, that the 3.5 billion year old Apex chert contained bacterial fossils, and eleven different species he identified clearly resembled cyanobacteria. According to Brasier, the fossils look much more like inorganic inclusions that just happened to resemble strings of bacteria (Laurence A. Moran. September 2nd, 2009). In some cases, they can form inorganically, when seawaters are over-saturated with chemical precipitates (fossilmall.com).
Sources -UCMP http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX7QNWEGcNI&feature=fvwp -Sandwalk blog http://sandwalk.blogspot.com/2009/09/did-life-arise-35-billion-years-ago.html -Fossilmall http://www.fossilmall.com/Science/About_Stromatolite.htm -Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromatolite
There are many lines of evidence supporting the fact that there was fossils 3.5 billion years ago. One of the biggest discovery was some Australian rocks that did not have petrified body parts like any other fossil but they had textures, that had once been living organisms, when they took them to be examined at the university of Northfolk, they stated that they were the oldest fossils ever described. another line of evidence supporting the fact that there was fossils 3.5 billion years ago are stromatolites, they are structures which are made by trapping cedementry grains, in the shallow water, the provide the most ancient life recorded, the go back to 3.5 billion years. Blue-green algae , is the oldest fossils in the world, its also known as cyanobacteria, they go back to the precambarian era. Sorces : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromatolite
Scientist said that bacteria ate sulphur from the ground. They know that because they measured the sulphur from the ground. They also said fossils were made of the cell walls of the bacteria. The fossils were, microfossils, microstructures that indicate biological affinity, including hollow cell lumens, carbonaceous cell walls, taphonomic degradation, organization into chains and clusters. They also found pyrite crystals, which are the metabolic products of the cells. With that they found that the microfossils are about 200 million older than they thought. http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v4/n10/full/ngeo1238.html
In the study published by Cell Press, scientists resurrected 4-billion-year-old Precambrian proteins. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/08/130808123826.htm
In the research done by Ben Waggoner and Brian Speer, says that cyanobacteria, also called “blue green algae”, have left fossil record that extends far back into the Precambrian. The oldest cyanobacteria fossil recorded is 3.5 billion years old. Cyanobacteria grow in an aquatic environment, trapping sediment and sometimes secreting calcium carbonate. Bacteria fossils are not particularly widespread, but under certain chemical conditions bacteria can be replaced with minerals, like pyrite or siderite, making replicas of the once living cell. http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/bacteria/bacteriafr.html
What FOSSIL evidence exists for bacteria? How do they know bacteria existed 3.5 BYA. Hint: Look up stromatolites!
It is unbelievable how something that grew possibly on sedimentary rocks billions of years ago, could actually be found. It is even more incredible that experts are now able to analyze, name and place these organisms in order to report how long ago they had existed. Bacteria proves to have existed before many other organisms, scientists and researchers have found physical evidence mostly on sedimentary rocks close to the ocean that bacteria dates back to the Precambrian era. Bacteria such as cyanobacteria, better known as the blue-green algae, left a record that is linked to the Precambrian era. The oldest found are about 3.5 million years old. US researchers found evidence as they studied some of the oldest rocks in the Pilbara region in Western Australia. One of the researchers named Dr. Noffke, says that the patterns and texture of the rocks are proof that the structures were developed by an ecosystem of many different kinds of bacteria that were in existence during the Achaean eon more than three billion years ago. According to J. William Schopf’s article “Fossil Evidence of Achaean Life”, forty-eight deposits were found all of which contained biogenic stromatolites, all dating back to more than three billion years BYA. Researches also mentioned that more evidence was also found in the Zebra River Canyon of the Kubis platform in the Zaris Mountains of Namibia. The bacteria found there is a type of thrombolite-stromatolite-metazon in the reefs that is said to have developed during the Proterozoic period. We will most likely continue to learn more as the years go by, and as researchers develop more technological resources in order to gather and analyze more information.
http://phys.org/news/2013-01-earliest-evidence-life-billion-years.html#jCp “Earliest evidence of life found: 3.49 billion years ago”, Lin Edward, January 4, 2013.
http://rstb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/361/1470/869.short “The Fossil Evidence of Archaean Life”, J. William Schopf, 2006 The Royal Society
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v416/n6876/abs/416076a.html “Letters to Nature” March 2007.
Usually when people picture fossils, they immediately think only about dinosaur relics. The fact is that not only dinosaurs left evidence of their existence. Bacteria probably provided the most amount of evidence on earth. These bacteria are called cyanobacteria or blue-green algae. Cyanobacteria are larger, and have a thicker layer than bacteria. They are aquatic and photosynthetic, they live in the water, and can manufacture their own food. Because they are bacteria, they are quite small and usually unicellular. They have the distinction of being the oldest known fossils, more than 3.5 billion years old, in fact! It may surprise you then to know that the cyanobacteria are still around; they are one of the largest and most important groups of bacteria on earth. Cyanobacteria have a wide variety of habitats that range from frozen lakes, to acidic bogs, to deserts and volcanoes. They are most commonly found in alkaline aquatic environments (but also in aquatic environments ranging in salinity and acidity), they can also be found in soil, on rocks, and even in the atmosphere (Bold, 1985). There are a number of unique characteristics of cyanobacteria that are responsible for this wide variety of habitats. In the Antarctic lakes, ponds and streams cyanobacteria form extensive microbial mats, where members of the Oscillatoriaceae seem to be the most predominant. [Vincent, Downes, Castenholz and Howard-Williams, 1993] Fifteen morphotypes of the family Oscillatoriaceae were found to be present in Taylor Valley [Alger, 1997]. Other families of cyanobacteria were also identified in [Alger, 1997].
How do scientists know bacteria existed 3.5 BYA? The key to know approximately the age of one of the oldest bacteria on earth is seen by the stromatolites. Stromatolites are calcareous mound built up of layers of lime-secreting cyanobacteria and trapped sediment, found in Precambrian rocks as the earliest known fossils, and still being formed in lagoons in Australasia. Modern-day examples of stromatolites can be found in waters off Australia, the Bahamas, and Belize. A small piece of stromatolites encode biological activity perhaps spanning thousands of years. In broad terms, stromatolites are fossil evidence of the prokaryotic life that remains today, as it has always been, the preponderance of biomass in the biosphere.
Prokaryotes maintain the homeostasis of the earth, rendering the biosphere habitable for all other life. They maintain and recycle the atomic ingredients of which proteins, the essence of life, are made, including oxygen, nitrogen and carbon. We humans are, in simple terms, bags of water filled with proteins and prokaryotic bacteria (the bacteria in your body outnumber the cells in your body about 10 to 1). We humans have descended from organisms that adapted in a prokaryotic world, and we humans retain in our Eukaryotic mitochondria, cellular machinery, from the prokaryotes of deep time on earth.
Sources: Brian Speer. "Introduction to the Cyanobacteria." University of California. Ucump. berkeley. Web. 3 September 1999
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/bacteria/
Terrio, P.J., Ostrodka, L.M., Loftin, K.A., Good, Gregg, and Holland, Teri, 2013, Initial results from a reconnaissance of cyanobacteria and associated toxins in Illinois, August–October 2012: U.S. Geological Survey Open–File Report 2013–1019, 4 p.
"Blue-Green Algae (Cyanobacteria)." Public health. State of California, 18 september 2013. Web. http://www.cdph.ca.gov/healthinfo/environhealth/water/pages/bluegreenalgae.aspx
In Australia, scientist had been analyzing rocks when they discovered traces of bacteria that have been alive 3.49 billion years ago. The traces of it were found on stromatolites. Stromatolites are the evidence that there was life on our planet 3.5 billion years ago. They are layered structures that are formed in shallow water.
ReplyDeleteThey are formed by the trapping, binding and cementation of the sedimentary grains of microorganisms. Most of the microorganisms found are cyanobacteria.
Cyanobacteria, also known as blue-green algae, have left fossil records that go as far as the Precambrian era1They are larger than most bacteria, but they are not bacteria or algae. Like algae, however, they photosynthesise2. Cyanobacteria were created because of a mutation of the purple sulphur bacteria that had chlorophyll. Their cells are preserved in a mineral replacement that is in an shapeless matric make of carbon that takes the part of the exopolysacchride investment of the colony of the cyanobacteria. 3
1http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/bacteria/bacteriafr.html
2http://austhrutime.com/cyanobacteria.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromatolite
3Tomescu AM, Honegger R, Rothwell GW. March 6, 2009
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18380874
4By Devin Powell,December 31, 2012
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-12-31/national/36103962_1_australian-rocks-sedimentary-rocks-oldest-fossils
Evidence that bacteria existed 3.5 billion years ago is found in fossils. One example of a fossil that has evidence of the bacteria that lived and continues to live today is stromatolites or stromatoliths. Stromatolites are layered accretionary structures formed in shallow water by the trapping, binding and cementation of sedimentary grains by biofilms of microorganism, especially cyanobacteria (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromatolite). Stromatolites provide the most ancient data of life in fossils which date back more than 3.5 billion years.
ReplyDeleteThe oldest know fossils are the cyanobacteria (AKA: blue-green algae) are from the Archean rocks found on the western side of Australia. These fossils have been dated back all the way to 3.5 billion years. The rocks that the bacteria was found was said to be 3.3 to 3.5 billion years ago. (http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/bacteria/cyanofr.html) (http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/oldest-fossils-reveal-life-3-4-billion-years-ago-1.978460?ref=rss)
These fossils included cell-like structures of all about the same size that looked like a microfossils of bacteria found that lived 2 billion years ago. They were found in clusters and chains very similar to the ones formed by bacteria today. (http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/oldest-fossils-reveal-life-3-4-billion-years-ago-1.978460?ref=rss)
The rocks found in Australia are “the best-preserved sedimentary rocks we know of, the ones most likely to preserve the really tiny structures and chemicals that provide evidence for life.” (Maud Walsh, biogeologist). There are older rocks on earth but these rocks are most likely to preserve they evidence of life from 3.5 billion years ago. This is because, unlike dinosaur bones, these fossils are not petrified. They are textures on the surfaces of sandstone. Created by thick mats of bacteria that glue together sand particles. The sand stuck to the land beneath the mats can be protected from weather erosion and eventually turn into rock that can outlast the living organisms above it. (http://spittalstreet.com/?p=6436)
"Fossils Found in Western Australia Could Be 3.5 Billion Years Old." SpittalStreetcom RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Sept. 2013. .
"'Oldest' Fossils Reveal Life 3.4 Billion Years Ago - Technology & Science - CBC News." CBCnews. CBC/Radio Canada, n.d. Web. 26 Sept. 2013. .
"Cyanobacteria: Fossil Record." Fossil Record of the Cyanobacteria. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Sept. 2013. .
"Stromatolite." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 19 Sept. 2013. Web. 26 Sept. 2013. .
Biofilms of Microorganisms, especially the cyanobacteria, form a large layered structure in the shallow water(wikipedia.org). The structure is called stromatolites when it is in dome-like shape, and oncolites when it is spherical shape (ucmp.berkeley.edu). Oncolites of microorganisms are also known as the fossil records of microorganisms (wikipedia.org), and the currently oldest cyanobacteria-like fossils found are nearly 3.5 billion years old (ump.berkeley.edu).
ReplyDeleteThere are About 1 billion years old short chain of cyanobacteria fossils found in Bitter Springs Chert of northern Australia were very similar to the cyanobacteria living today; in fact, most fossil cyanobacteria can almost be referred to living genera(ucmp.berkeley.edu). Some Archean rock formations show microscopic similarity to modern microbial structures(wikipedia.org).
J. William Schopf, paleontologist at the University of California, LA, discovered bacteria fossils in Apec chert - Ancient rocks in the northern parts of West Australia. He published his result, that the 3.5 billion year old Apex chert contained bacterial fossils, and eleven different species he identified clearly resembled cyanobacteria. According to Brasier, the fossils look much more like inorganic inclusions that just happened to resemble strings of bacteria (Laurence A. Moran. September 2nd, 2009). In some cases, they can form inorganically, when seawaters are over-saturated with chemical precipitates (fossilmall.com).
Sources
-UCMP http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX7QNWEGcNI&feature=fvwp
-Sandwalk blog http://sandwalk.blogspot.com/2009/09/did-life-arise-35-billion-years-ago.html
-Fossilmall http://www.fossilmall.com/Science/About_Stromatolite.htm
-Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromatolite
There are many lines of evidence supporting the fact that there was fossils 3.5 billion years ago. One of the biggest discovery was some Australian rocks that did not have petrified body parts like any other fossil but they had textures, that had once been living organisms, when they took them to be examined at the university of Northfolk, they stated that they were the oldest fossils ever described. another line of evidence supporting the fact that there was fossils 3.5 billion years ago are stromatolites, they are structures which are made by trapping cedementry grains, in the shallow water, the provide the most ancient life recorded, the go back to 3.5 billion years. Blue-green algae , is the oldest fossils in the world, its also known as cyanobacteria, they go back to the precambarian era.
ReplyDeleteSorces : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromatolite
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-12-31/national/36103962_1_australian-rocks-sedimentary-rocks-oldest-fossils
Scientist said that bacteria ate sulphur from the ground. They know that because they measured the sulphur from the ground. They also said fossils were made of the cell walls of the bacteria. The fossils were, microfossils, microstructures that indicate biological affinity, including hollow cell lumens, carbonaceous cell walls, taphonomic degradation, organization into chains and clusters. They also found pyrite crystals, which are the metabolic products of the cells. With that they found that the microfossils are about 200 million older than they thought.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v4/n10/full/ngeo1238.html
In the study published by Cell Press, scientists resurrected 4-billion-year-old Precambrian proteins.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/08/130808123826.htm
In the research done by Ben Waggoner and Brian Speer, says that cyanobacteria, also called “blue green algae”, have left fossil record that extends far back into the Precambrian. The oldest cyanobacteria fossil recorded is 3.5 billion years old. Cyanobacteria grow in an aquatic environment, trapping sediment and sometimes secreting calcium carbonate.
Bacteria fossils are not particularly widespread, but under certain chemical conditions bacteria can be replaced with minerals, like pyrite or siderite, making replicas of the once living cell.
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/bacteria/bacteriafr.html
What FOSSIL evidence exists for bacteria? How do they know bacteria existed 3.5 BYA. Hint: Look up stromatolites!
ReplyDeleteIt is unbelievable how something that grew possibly on sedimentary rocks billions of years ago, could actually be found. It is even more incredible that experts are now able to analyze, name and place these organisms in order to report how long ago they had existed. Bacteria proves to have existed before many other organisms, scientists and researchers have found physical evidence mostly on sedimentary rocks close to the ocean that bacteria dates back to the Precambrian era.
Bacteria such as cyanobacteria, better known as the blue-green algae, left a record that is linked to the Precambrian era. The oldest found are about 3.5 million years old. US researchers found evidence as they studied some of the oldest rocks in the Pilbara region in Western Australia. One of the researchers named Dr. Noffke, says that the patterns and texture of the rocks are proof that the structures were developed by an ecosystem of many different kinds of bacteria that were in existence during the Achaean eon more than three billion years ago.
According to J. William Schopf’s article “Fossil Evidence of Achaean Life”, forty-eight deposits were found all of which contained biogenic stromatolites, all dating back to more than three billion years BYA. Researches also mentioned that more evidence was also found in the Zebra River Canyon of the Kubis platform in the Zaris Mountains of Namibia. The bacteria found there is a type of thrombolite-stromatolite-metazon in the reefs that is said to have developed during the Proterozoic period.
We will most likely continue to learn more as the years go by, and as researchers develop more technological resources in order to gather and analyze more information.
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/bacteria/bacteriafr.html
http://phys.org/news/2013-01-earliest-evidence-life-billion-years.html#jCp
“Earliest evidence of life found: 3.49 billion years ago”, Lin Edward, January 4, 2013.
http://rstb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/361/1470/869.short
“The Fossil Evidence of Archaean Life”, J. William Schopf, 2006 The Royal Society
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v416/n6876/abs/416076a.html
“Letters to Nature” March 2007.
Usually when people picture fossils, they immediately think only about dinosaur relics. The fact is that not only dinosaurs left evidence of their existence. Bacteria probably provided the most amount of evidence on earth. These bacteria are called cyanobacteria or blue-green algae. Cyanobacteria are larger, and have a thicker layer than bacteria. They are aquatic and photosynthetic, they live in the water, and can manufacture their own food. Because they are bacteria, they are quite small and usually unicellular. They have the distinction of being the oldest known fossils, more than 3.5 billion years old, in fact! It may surprise you then to know that the cyanobacteria are still around; they are one of the largest and most important groups of bacteria on earth.
ReplyDeleteCyanobacteria have a wide variety of habitats that range from frozen lakes, to acidic bogs, to deserts and volcanoes. They are most commonly found in alkaline aquatic environments (but also in aquatic environments ranging in salinity and acidity), they can also be found in soil, on rocks, and even in the atmosphere (Bold, 1985). There are a number of unique characteristics of cyanobacteria that are responsible for this wide variety of habitats.
In the Antarctic lakes, ponds and streams cyanobacteria form extensive microbial mats, where members of the Oscillatoriaceae seem to be the most predominant. [Vincent, Downes, Castenholz and Howard-Williams, 1993] Fifteen morphotypes of the family Oscillatoriaceae were found to be present in Taylor Valley [Alger, 1997]. Other families of cyanobacteria were also identified in [Alger, 1997].
How do scientists know bacteria existed 3.5 BYA?
ReplyDeleteThe key to know approximately the age of one of the oldest bacteria on earth is seen by the stromatolites. Stromatolites are calcareous mound built up of layers of lime-secreting cyanobacteria and trapped sediment, found in Precambrian rocks as the earliest known fossils, and still being formed in lagoons in Australasia.
Modern-day examples of stromatolites can be found in waters off Australia, the Bahamas, and Belize.
A small piece of stromatolites encode biological activity perhaps spanning thousands of years. In broad terms, stromatolites are fossil evidence of the prokaryotic life that remains today, as it has always been, the preponderance of biomass in the biosphere.
Prokaryotes maintain the homeostasis of the earth, rendering the biosphere habitable for all other life. They maintain and recycle the atomic ingredients of which proteins, the essence of life, are made, including oxygen, nitrogen and carbon. We humans are, in simple terms, bags of water filled with proteins and prokaryotic bacteria (the bacteria in your body outnumber the cells in your body about 10 to 1). We humans have descended from organisms that adapted in a prokaryotic world, and we humans retain in our Eukaryotic mitochondria, cellular machinery, from the prokaryotes of deep time on earth.
Sources:
Brian Speer. "Introduction to the Cyanobacteria." University of California. Ucump. berkeley. Web. 3 September 1999
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/bacteria/
Terrio, P.J., Ostrodka, L.M., Loftin, K.A., Good, Gregg, and Holland, Teri, 2013, Initial results from a reconnaissance of cyanobacteria and associated toxins in Illinois, August–October 2012: U.S. Geological Survey Open–File Report 2013–1019, 4 p.
http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2013/1019/
Fossil , Dealers. "Stromatolite Fossils." Fossilmallcom Home. Fossil mall. Web. 2006
http://www.fossilmall.com/Science/About_Stromatolite.htm
"Blue-Green Algae (Cyanobacteria)." Public health. State of California, 18 september 2013. Web.
http://www.cdph.ca.gov/healthinfo/environhealth/water/pages/bluegreenalgae.aspx
M.H., Monroe. "Cynobacteria." Biology . N.p., n.d. Web. 2003
http://austhrutime.com/cyanobacteria.htm
Brenda, Gow. "Cynobacteria." academics. N.p.. Web. 1999
http://academics.smcvt.edu/dfacey/AquaticBiology/Freshwater%20Pages/Cyanobacteria.html
Stromatolites, Fossils. "Capitol Reef." National Park Service. U.S. Department of the Interior, 25 September 2013. Web.
http://www.nps.gov/care/naturescience/stromatolite.htm