making them the oldest Earth materials ever found. Zircon crystals are durable; they can survive even when the rocks around them are destroyed, eroded or recycled back into Earth's middle layer.

One photographer put the age of starlight into perspective with stunning projections on some of Earth's oldest rock ...

each layer of rock is older than the one above it and younger than the one below it (Figures 1 and 2). Accordingly, the oldest rocks in a sequence are at the bottom and the youngest rocks are at ...

Bedrock along the northeast coast of Hudson Bay, Canada, has the oldest rock on Earth. Disclaimer: AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert!

undisturbed volcanic rock 3,850 million years old lies atop sedimentary rock. Within this deeper (and older) layer are minerals that contain telltale signs of past biological activity: carbon ...

You don't have any saved articles. Our scientists have been looking for a rock that formed so long ago it was on Earth before complex life lived on land. Called Lewisian gneiss, it’s the oldest rock ...