0
How would you date a sample rock that you suspect as being one of the earliest on earth?
Wiki User
∙ 12y ago
You would use a radioactive isotope with a long half life. Good luck!
Alvah Stokes
Wiki User
∙ 14y agoThere are a number of techniques that might be used.
One method to date rocks, if you know their origins, is to compare their location to locations of other rocks of known age. Rocks found in the earth are usually older than the rocks found above them. Some rock formations show layers of sediment that can be uniquely dated. We can even count layers of sediment for refinement in some cases, to provide relative dates.
Another way to date rock is to locate fossils and identify them. Many species only existed at certain times, and in the cases of most fossils found, the times are known.
Rocks can be dated by radiometric techniques. This is done by comparing quantities of isotopes, at least one of which is radioactive. The best known method of radiometric dating is probably carbon-14 dating, which is usually not important in dating rocks, but there are other similar techniques than can date rocks that are even over a billion years old. Radiometric dating cannot always be used, however, even when the isotopes used are present, because conditions can change (as by geological heating) that render the technique unusable.
Wiki User
∙ 13y agoAsk it out. Buy it dinner. and take it home.
Wiki User
∙ 10y agouse a radioactive isotope with a long half life
Add your answer:
Earn +20 pts
Why pieces of earth's earliest crust do not exist today?
why do pieces of earths earliest crust not exist today
How would this soil sample be described?
Crumbly, bits of earth.
How long has life been on earth?
The best guess is somewhere between 3.5 and 4 billion years, with the earliest clear fossil evidence being about 3.4 billion years old.
Why do the earliest rock samples date from 800 million years after Earth formed?
IT took the earth this long to cool enough to form rocks
Why have paleontologist not found any rock from the earliest years of earth existence?
It was to hot for rocks to form
How would you date a sample of rock that you suspect being one of the earliest on Earth?
You would use a radioactive isotope with a long half life. Good luck!
What is measured by the pulling of gravity on a sample of matter?
The gravitational forces in each direction between the Earth and a sample of matterare equal. The force exerted on the sample by the Earth is what we call the "weight"of the sample. The force exerted by the sample on the Earth is the one that nobodyever mentions, but it's also equal to the weight of the sample. In other words, theweight of the sample on Earth is equal to the weight of the Earth on the sample.
When did the earliest organisims appear on Earth?
Nobody really knows when the earliest organisms were on Earth. It was definitely more than a million years ago.
When is the earliest trace of humans on earth?
The earliest traces of humans on Earth date back to about 2.8 million years ago, with the discovery of hominin fossils in Ethiopia being some of the earliest evidence of human ancestors. These early hominins were part of the genus Australopithecus, such as "Lucy" (Australopithecus afarensis), and represent our early evolutionary history.
Why pieces of earth's earliest crust do not exist today?
why do pieces of earths earliest crust not exist today
Earliest people known on Earth?
Adam and Eve
Among the earliest life forms on earth?
Cyanobacteria
Among the earliest life-forms on Earth?
cyanobacteria
A sample collected by drilling into Earth's surface with a hollow drill and pulling out a column of soil and rocks?
a core sample
How the earliest people thought about the shape of the earth?
They thought is was flat.
The earliest known group of living organisms on earth was?
Prokaryots
What is The earliest life forms on earth lived?
The earliest ones still around are stromatolites, but there were lots of earlier life forms.
