The original version of this story appeared in Quanta Magazine. Scientists have come to realize that in the soil and rocks beneath our feet there lies a vast biosphere with a global volume nearly ...

For roughly 2 billion years of Earth's early history, the atmosphere contained no oxygen, the essential ingredient required for complex life. Oxygen began building up during the period known as the ...

Sensor readings seemed to show that oxygen was being made on the seabed 4,000 meters (about 13,100 feet) below the surface, where no light can penetrate. The same thing happened on three subsequent ...

Potato-sized lumps of metal on the seafloor are generating oxygen, a new study has found. Scientists previously believed that oxygen was strictly formed as a byproduct of photosynthesizing plants.