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NOVA: Life's Rocky Start

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Wednesday, January 13 at 8PM on MPB TV

Four and a half billion years ago, the young Earth was a hellish place—a seething chaos of meteorite impacts, volcanoes belching noxious gases, and lightning flashing through a thin, torrid atmosphere. Then, in a process that has puzzled scientists for decades, life emerged. How did it happen? NOVA joins mineralogist Robert Hazen on the rocky trail to resolve this enduring mystery.