The effects of the melting polar ice caps may one day be felt well beyond the poles, though. As the polar ice caps shrink, sea levels begin to rise, creating serious problems for coastal areas around the globe. Fortunately, we can do our part to slow down and prevent the environmental changes causing the polar ice caps to melt.
Paabo and colleagues used a new method for sequencing ancient, degraded genetic material to put together the 400,000-year-old specimen's mitochondrial genome. It is the oldest DNA ever found outside permafrost conditions -- in other words, it was not permanently frozen.
Oldest Fossils Ever Found Date Back 3.49 Billion Years, Australia Research Shows. Three-and-a-half billion years is a long time â after all, humans have only been around for about 2.3 million years. But scientists working in Western Australia's geologically rich Pilbara region say they've found the world's oldest fossils -- tiny weblike patterns on sandstone that date back 3.49 billion years.