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Article: HOW WE ALL BROKE THE ICE MILLIONS OF YEARS AGO `SNOWBALL EARTH' LED TO LIFE, RESEARCHER SAYS.(News)
- Article from:
- Seattle Post-Intelligencer
- Article date:
- August 28, 1998
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1998 Seattle Post-Intelligencer. All rights reserved. Reproduced with the permission of the Dialog Corporation by Gale Group. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Glaring white ice 300 feet deep covered all the oceans. Temperatures dropped to minus 20 degrees. The land was barren, dry, frigid, lifeless.
That was Earth 750 million years ago in what may have been the planet's coldest and longest ice age. But it may also have been a vital period in the evolution of plants, animals and eventually even people, a researcher says.
``Without these ice events, it is possible there wouldn't be any animals or higher plants,'' said Paul Hoffman, a Harvard University researcher and co-author of a study to be published today in the journal Science.
The research supports a six-year-old theory that Earth was a ...