Recent News
Two group publications have recently hit the headlines, detailing research into early life and the biosphere. First, a paper documenting possibly the Earth's oldest fossils from the Strelley Pool Formation, Australia (Wacey et al., 2011, Nature Geoscience), was reported by many international news outlets, and even made the front page of New York Times.
More recently, our publication discussing the potential of pumice as a substrate for early life has been publicized (Brasier et al., 2011, Astrobiology).
Martin's next popular science book, called Robert Hooke’s Secret Chamber, will be about the hidden evolutionary history of the cell, and is planned with OUP for early 2012.
Previous Media Coverage
Leila Battison and Martin Brasier are coauthors on a paper describing fossils of the earliest terrestrial eukaryotes, published in the journal Nature. A brief interview given by Martin, explaining the importance of the find, can be found here.
Over the last year, Martin Brasier and his group have been stretching out to a wider public about the early history of life. This has included lectures alongside Richard Dawkins in Oxford, and a televised debate for NASA’s 50th birthday celebrations.
A CBC programme showing Martin’s research students (Alex Liu, Jack Matthews and Daniel Collins) in the field, critically testing the evidence for the earliest animal fossils, was also aired in November 2010.
Visiting Academics
Recent visitors to the group in the past six months include;
Dr. Dima Grazhdankin (IPGG, Novosibirsk)
Dr. Nikolai Mastushkin (IPGG, Novosibirsk)
Prof. Nora Noffke (Old Dominion University)
Prof. Lynn Margulis (University of Massachusetts)
Dr. Jonathan Antcliffe (University of Bristol)
Prof. Tim Lyons (University of California, Riverside)
Prof. Soren Jensen (Extremadura)
Prof. Charles Cockell (University of Edinburgh)
Prof. Paul Strother (Boston College, Massachusetts)