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A Geochemical History of Life on Earth

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Justin Rowlatt tells the story of how our planet was made

Humanity is conducting a giant chemistry experiment with Earth’s atmosphere and oceans, but is it really unprecedented? Justin Rowlatt tells the story of how our planet was made.

Humanity is conducting a giant chemistry experiment with our planet’s atmosphere and oceans, filling them with unprecedented amounts of nitrogen, phosphorus, and above all carbon dioxide.

But is it really unprecedented? In a series of five programmes, Justin Rowlatt explores the geochemical history of life on Earth, and discovers how humans are just the latest species to suddenly emerge and transform the planet’s chemistry, with devastating consequences.

Image: A banded iron formation (Credit: The Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London/BBC)

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A Geochemical History of Life on Earth: 3. A series of unfortunate events

3. A series of unfortunate events

16/10/2021 GMT

BBC World Service - A Geochemical History of Life on Earth, 3. A series of unfortunate eventsSearch BBC

How a chemical element may have held evolution back for a billion years

Justin discovers how phosphorus may have held evolution back for a billion years, and why volcanoes have both rescued and almost wiped out life on the planet.

Justin Rowlatt discovers how phosphorus may have held evolution back for a billion years. How plants first colonised the land - precipitating an ice age in the process. And why volcanoes have both rescued and almost wiped out life on the planet, thanks to the carbon dioxide they emit.

Anjali Goswami of the Natural History Museum takes Justin on a tour of the big five mass extinction events in the fossil record over the last half billion years. But could we humans be adding a sixth one to the list? Tim Lenton of Exeter University explains why he thinks lowly lichen may have turned the Earth into a snowball. And Graham Shields of UCL tells us why we should all hug a volcano, even if one does occasionally wipe out 95% of all life on Earth.

Producer: Laurence Knight

Image: Tyrannosaurus Rex looking up at an incoming meteor (Credit: Detlev van Ravenswaay / Science Photo Library)

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A Geochemical History of Life on Earth

3. A series of unfortunate events

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