World’s Oldest Biological Color Found In Sahara Desert: Australian researchers have uncovered the world’s oldest biological color in the Sahara desert, in a find they said Tuesday helped explain why complex lifeforms only recently emerged on earth.
“Algae, although still microscopic, are a thousand times larger in volume than cyanobacteria, and are a much richer food source,” Brocks told AFP.
Scientists came across the samples accidentally when an oil company drilling in the Taoudeni basin in West Africa sent them rocks for analysis.
The pigments are fossilized relics of chlorophyll, a chemical that allows plants and some microscopic life forms to turn light into energy.