PUBLIC LECTURE: Earth at a Time of a Run-Away Ice Age

Building off of a ground-breaking paper published in Nature in 2008, Professor Huiming Bao (Louisiana State University and 2010 UWA Gledden Visiting Senior Fellow) and colleagues have discovered a new line of evidence supporting a truly alien Earth condition which took place approximately 635 million years ago, when the Earth is believed to have just recovered from a “snowball” state. During this time, the planet was covered entirely by ice for several millions of years.

In this public lecture, Dr Bao will explore the background of the “snowball” Earth hypothesis, evidence for or against it, the implication of his group’s recent findings, and why Western Australia may hold some of the key tests for the “snowball’ Earth hypothesis.