A present-day orange demosponge (Agelas oroides) can be found off the coast of Corfu, Greece. Research suggests sponges may have lived on Earth 890 million years ago. Norbert Probst via Getty Images ...

Simple animal life may have existed in Earth’s oceans 890 million years ago, according to new research. Recently discovered fossils belonging to ancient sponges might be the earliest known remnants of ...

The fossils are more than 350 million years older than the next-oldest sponge fossils. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. That sea ...

Relatives of the humble sea sponge have filtered Earth's waters for hundreds of millions of years or more, long before the first plants took to land. Their simplicity has led scientists to suggest ...

Surprisingly, genome comparisons have failed to resolve a major question in animal evolution: Which living animals are the descendants of the earliest animals to evolve in the world's oceans?

For more than a century, biologists have wondered what the earliest animals were like when they first arose in the ancient oceans over half a billion years ago. Searching among today's most ...