When is the End really?

[Islander]

Prokaryote is single-celled organisms I believe .

A prokaryote is a bacterium (or a member of the archaea) without a nucleus. A eukaryote is a bacterium with a nucleus. They're usually single celled but some are multi-cell at specific points in their development.

[JamesF]

A prokaryote is a bacterium (or a member of the archaea) without a nucleus. A eukaryote is a bacterium with a nucleus. They're usually single celled but some are multi-cell at specific points in their development.

Ahh, the Archaea are the other group, yes. I was fairly sure that by definition, bacteria don't have a nucleus though. If you have a reference that suggests they can I'd be interested to see it because it means I've misunderstood.

James

[Islander]

Yes you are right. Super volcanoes like Yellowstone are more of a 'tear apart' kind I believe that allows lava to flow over a vast area. However there will, I suppose, still be eruptions, but along the length of the rip.

There a suppervolcano in India that produced so much lava over a long period, that it is miles thick called the Deccan Traps

http://www.geosociety.org/news/pr/05-27.htm

Makes interesting reading if nothing else.

The Deccan traps were caused by a flood basalt associated with plate tectonics rather than being a supervolcano per se. It was one of the causes of the K-T extinction event.

There was a supervolcano eruption (Toba) in Indonesia about 70,000 years ago that very nearly stopped mankind in it's tracks. It was a VEI-8 eruption and the biggest in the last quarter of a million years. It left a caldera lake 100km long and 30km wide and caused a 10 year volcanic winter and is thought to have precipitated a further 1000 years of global cooling. It certainly set development back by a long way - we were down to somewhere between 1000-10,000 breeding pairs and extinction was a real possibility. We were lucky that time.

[Islander]

Ahh, the Archaea are the other group, yes. I was fairly sure that by definition, bacteria don't have a nucleus though. If you have a reference that suggests they can I'd be interested to see it because it means I've misunderstood.

James

Yep sorry typo - I got carried away typing bacterium. :icon_scratch:Bacteria are exclusively prokaryotes. The three domains of life are archaea, prokaryotes and eukaryotes with eukaryotes representing multi-cellular life.

[JamesF]

Yep sorry typo - I got carried away typing bacterium. :icon_scratch:Bacteria are exclusively prokaryotes. The three domains of life are archaea, prokaryotes and eukaryotes with eukaryotes representing multi-cellular life.

Ah, jolly good. Thanks.

James