<p>For those of you interested in major scientific discoveries:</p>
<p>[Scientists</a> find oldest record of animal life on Earth This Just In - CNN.com Blogs](<a href=“http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2010/08/18/scientists-find-oldest-record-of-life-on-earth/]Scientists”>http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2010/08/18/scientists-find-oldest-record-of-life-on-earth/)</p>
<p>[Princeton</a> University - Possible discovery of earliest animal life pushes back fossil record](<a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S28/14/71M11/index.xml?section=topstories]Princeton”>http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S28/14/71M11/index.xml?section=topstories)</p>
<p>"Fossils from Australia show animal life on Earth began at least 650 million years ago, 70 million years earlier than previous estimates, Princeton University scientists report.</p>
<p>Princeton geosciences professor Adam Maloof and graduate student Catherine Rose came upon the fossils while researching a massive ice age, known as the snowball effect, that left much of the planet covered in ice 635 million years ago. Scientists had thought animal life could not have survived that ice age. But as they inspected a glacial deposit in south Australia, they found the fossils of the sponge-like ocean reef animals.</p>
<p>No one was expecting that we would find animals that lived before the ice age, and since animals probably did not evolve twice, we are suddenly confronted with the question of how some relative of these reef-dwelling animals survived the 'snowball Earth," Maloof said. . . . (continued)</p>
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<p>This is a fascinating discovery and is getting a great deal of international press… More information about the Geosciences Department at Princeton can be found here:</p>
<p>[Geosciences</a> Undergraduate Program](<a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/geosciences/undergraduate/]Geosciences”>Undergraduate Education | The Department of Geosciences)</p>