Explore the frontiers of science with this revolutionary course that rewrites the history of our planet as a single, compelling story involving the coevolution of rocks and life.
The Origin and Evolution of Earth: From the Big Bang to the Future of Human Existence
Overview
Syllabus
- By This Professor
- 01: Mineralogy and a New View of Earth
- 02: Origin and Evolution of the Early Universe
- 03: Origins of the Elements-Nucleosynthesis
- 04: Ur-Minerals, First Crystals in the Cosmos
- 05: Presolar Dust Grains-Chemistry Begins
- 06: Coming to Grips with Deep Time
- 07: The Birth of the Solar System
- 08: The Early Solar System-Terrestrial Planets
- 09: Hints from the Gas Giants and Their Moons
- 10: Meteorites-The Oldest Objects You Can Hold
- 11: Mineral Evolution, Go! Chondrite Meteorites
- 12: Meteorite Types and Planetesimals
- 13: Achondrites and Geochemical Affinities
- 14: The Accretion and Differentiation of Earth
- 15: How Did the Moon Form?
- 16: The Big Thwack!
- 17: The "Big Six" Elements of Early Earth
- 18: The Black Earth-Peridotite to Basalt
- 19: Origins of the Oceans
- 20: Blue Earth and the Water Cycle
- 21: Earth and Mars versus Mercury and the Moon
- 22: Gray Earth-Clays and the Rise of Granite
- 23: Earth's Mineralogy Takes Off-Pegmatites
- 24: Moving Continents and the Rock Cycle
- 25: Plate Tectonics Changes Everything
- 26: Geochemistry to Biochemistry-Raw Materials
- 27: Biomolecules-Select, Concentrate, Assemble
- 28: Why Reproduction? World Enough and Time
- 29: Eons, Eras, and Strategies of Early Life
- 30: Red Earth-The Great Oxidation Event
- 31: Earliest Microbial and Molecular Fossils?
- 32: Microbial Mats and Which Minerals Can Form
- 33: Earth's Greatest Mineral Explosion
- 34: The Boring Billion? Cratons and Continents
- 35: The Supercontinent Cycle
- 36: Feedback Loops and Tipping Points
- 37: Snowball Earth and Hothouse Earth
- 38: The Second Great Oxidation Event
- 39: Deep Carbon-Deep Life, Fuels, and Methane
- 40: Biominerals and Early Animals
- 41: Between Rodinia and Pangaea-Plants on Land
- 42: Life Speeds Up-Oxygen and Climate Swings
- 43: From the "Great Dying" to Dinosaurs
- 44: Impact! From Dinosaurs to Mammals
- 45: Humans and the Anthropocene Epoch
- 46: The Next 5 Billion Years
- 47: The Nearer Future
- 48: Coevolution of Geosphere and Biosphere
Taught by
Robert M. Hazen
