Did the First Deep-Ocean Animals Live in a World with Negligible Oxygen?

[Oxytropidoceras]

Did the First Animals Live in a World Without Oxygen?

A new study suggests the answer may be yes.

https://www.airspacemag.com/daily-planet/did-first-animals-live-world-without-oxygen-1-180967792/

 

Stolper, D.A. and Keller, C.B., 2018. A record of deep-ocean

dissolved O2 from the oxidation state of iron in submarine

basalts. Nature, 553, pages 323–327

Received: 10 July 2017, Accepted: 02 November 2017

Published online: 03 January 2018

https://www.nature.com/articles/nature25009

 

yours,

 

Paul H.

[Herb]

many of the black shales come from a low oxygen environment

[Wrangellian]

Even if the oceans weren't full of oxygen, the Ediacarans were known to rest on/move across (and eat?) microbial mats. Would these mats not produce oxygen, and would there not therefore be more O2 at the sea bed where the Ediacarans lived than there was in the ocean as a whole?

[doushantuo]