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Ancient air caught by shooting stars

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Ashes of ancient meteors recovered from a 2.7-billion-year-old lake bed imply that the upper atmosphere was rich in oxygen at a time when all other evidence implies that the atmosphere was oxygen-free. See Letter p.235

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Figure 1: Possible mechanisms of oxygen enrichment in the Archaean atmosphere.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Kevin Zahnle is in the Space Science Division, NASA Ames Research Centre, Moffett Field, California 94035-1000, USA.,

    Kevin Zahnle

  2. Roger Buick is in the Department of Earth & Space Sciences, and in the Astrobiology Program, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195-1310, USA.,

    Roger Buick

Authors
  1. Kevin Zahnle
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  2. Roger Buick
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Correspondence to Kevin Zahnle or Roger Buick.

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Zahnle, K., Buick, R. Ancient air caught by shooting stars. Nature 533, 184–186 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/533184a

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