On the hunt for ancient reefs

Dr Ashleigh Hood’s career in geology began as a child.

“When I was just a kid, my grandpa used to take me on walks. I’d find rocks and put them in people’s letterboxes, so that was the start of my love affair with geology,” says Dr Hood.

She now searches the globe for ancient reefs, looking for ancient life forms and information about animal evolution. No longer in the oceans, these 500 million-year-old reefs are preserved high in mountains across Canada, Namibia and Australia.

“Earth’s history spans back about 4.5 billion years, so these tiny little slivers of rock record one snapshot of time, Dr Hood says. “Our work addresses one of the most fundamental questions in science – how did we get here?

“This is, of course, a very big question.”

“For example, these reefs formed during a time called Snowball Earth, which is when the Earth froze over almost completely, twice. This was the most severe climate change in Earth’s history and so right in the middle of this big ice age we see these huge tropical reefs grow,” Dr Hood says.

“We know, for example, that animals potentially survived this climate change and so can use examples like this to better understand how we’re going to go with climate change in the future.”

Episode recorded: December 4, 2019.

Interviewer: Dr Andi Horvath.

Producer, audio engineer and editor: Chris Hatzis.

Co-production: Silvi Vann-Wall and Dr Andi Horvath.

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