UJ Professors’ discovery
AUCKLAND PARK- University of Johannesburg professors contribute to ground-breaking research on the presence of oxygen in the Earth’s atmosphere.
Two researchers from the University of Johannesburg (UJ) have contributed to a recent study that is rewriting what we know about the history of planet Earth.
Professors Nic Beukes and Stefanus Kruger from the university’s Geology department were a part of a group that recently published a ground-breaking paper in leading science journal ‘Nature’.
The authors, led by Sean Crowe, an assistant professor in earth, ocean and atmospheric sciences at the University of British Columbia, found that oxygen was present in Earth’s atmosphere millions of years earlier than previously believed. The group reported on rock and soil samples from the Pongola Supergroup in South Africa — one of the oldest ancient soils in the world today.
The Pongola Supergroup spans parts of southeast South Africa and Swaziland. It contains some of the world’s best preserved soil, allowing scientists like Beukes and Stefanus to use advanced technology to study the history of our physical world.
“Until now, scientists believed that there was no oxygen in the atmosphere for at least hundreds of millions of years after the Earth was formed,” Beukes explained.
“This study now suggests that the process began very early in Earth’s history, supporting a much greater antiquity for oxygen producing photosynthesis and aerobic life.”
