Scientists analyzed halite samples from 830 million years ago using optical techniques. Inside the samples, they found microorganisms such as bacteria, algae and fungi that may still be alive.

As rock salt — or “halite”, as mineralogists call it — crystallises out of saline waters, it can entrap tiny amounts of the parent waters as a so-called fluid inclusion. And if the ...

Primary fluid inclusions in bedded halite from the 830-million-year-old Browne Formation of central Australia contain organic solids and liquids, as documented with transmitted light and UV-vis ...

Rocks and minerals often take millions of years to form. This week's episode of Mineral Monday, however, looks at a mineral that moves much faster than that: halite! The College of Science weekly ...

The salt crystals (aka halite) that Benison and her team studied were originally found in central Australia. Benison was part of the team that published these findings in the journal Geology.

The single-celled organisms are locked in tiny fluid pockets — smaller than the width of a human hair — in halite, or salt, from a formation of sedimentary rocks. The microorganisms lived ...