Oxygen played a key role in the evolution of complex organisms, according to new research published in BMC Evolutionary Biology. The study shows that the complexity of life forms increased earlier ...

Around 700 million years ago, Earth was a frozen, white sphere, its rocky surface buried kilometers under ice. Despite the barren landscape, the evolution of complex life in the oceans was about to ...

Environmental evidence of the very first experiments in the evolution of complex life on Earth, has been uncovered by an international team of scientists. Until now, scientists broadly accepted ...

The team has proposed a new evidence-based scenario for the emergence of complex life they have called ‘CALM’ - Complex Archaeon, Late Mitochondrion. Complex life began to develop earlier, and over a ...

The original version of this story appeared in Quanta Magazine. Far from being solo operators, most single-celled microbes are in complex relationships. In the ocean, the soil, and your gut, they ...

This figure presents a modern tree of Life, highlighting eukaryotes (organisms with complex cells) based on genome-scale analyses from Valt et al. (2025). The newly identified and ancient supergroup ...

Complex life began to develop earlier, and over a longer span of time, than previously believed, a new study has revealed. The research sheds new light on the conditions needed for early organisms to ...

Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more. More than half a ...

The timeline of terrestrial evolution holds surprises. While scientists thought complex life required oxygen, a recent discovery shows it began forming in oceans deprived of this element, nearly a ...

Life’s leap from single-celled to multicellular organisms marks a pivotal moment in evolutionary history. This transformation laid the foundation for the complex life forms we see today. By studying ...

The evolution of intelligent life around red dwarf stars is likely to be an uphill slog, due to the demands needed to jumpstart oxygenic photosynthesis. Given that red M-dwarf stars are by far the ...