4.5 billion years of Earth history in one hour - with Bolton Howes

Did you know the continents move at the same rate as your fingernails grow? Welcome BACK to Tiny Living Beings after a couple years off! For the first episode of the new season, I have Dr. Bolton Howes on to give a geologist's perspective on the history of the Earth that I hope will give context for all the other episodes of this show. We discuss everything from the origin of the planet 4.5 billion years ago to the first life, when plants and animals evolved, the two times Earth turned into a literal snowball, giant bugs, dinosaurs, climate change, and why it's so hard to reconstruct the past.

Bolton is a sedimentary geologist finishing up his postdoctoral research fellowship at University of Washington and Western Washington University. He will be starting a professorship at Wheaton College in the summer. You can follow his work here or on his website.

Some resources Bolton mentions during the episode that may be of interest if you want to learn more about Earth's history are:

1. Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History by Stephen Jay Gould
2. Extinction: How Life on Earth Nearly Ended 250 Million Years Ago by Douglas H. Erwin
3. Radiolab episode about dino extinction: Dinopocalypse Redux
4. I also enjoyed this book many years ago: Life on a Young Planet by Andrew H. Knoll

For more info on microbes and to follow updates of this podcast, find @couch_microscopy on Instagram or visit www.couchmicroscopy.com/store for merch!

Music is "Introducing Cosmic Space" (2021 remix) by Elf Power and "Vorticella Dreams" by L. Felipe Benites.

The views and opinions expressed on this program are those of the host and guests and do not reflect the views of any institution.