Great Oxidation Event: More oxygen through multicellularity
Thursday, January 17, 2013 - 09:31
in Earth & Climate
The appearance of free oxygen in the Earth’s atmosphere led to the Great Oxidation Event. This was triggered by cyanobacteria producing the oxygen which developed into multicellular forms as early as 2.3 billion years ago. As evolutionary biologists have shown, this multicellularity was linked to the rise in oxygen and thus played a significant role for life on Earth as it is today.