Abigail Allwood at one of the ancient reef outcrops in Western Australia.

Macquarie University PhD student Abigail Allwood was named one of Australia's top 10 scientific minds under 45 by COSMOS magazine.

The scientific luminaries were selected by the Australian magazine's editorial board, including Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin, scientists and authors Paul Davies and Mike Archer and ABC radio Science Show presenter Robyn Williams.

Allwood's work also made the front cover of the prestigious international scientific journal Nature earlier this year.

She grabbed headlines around the world for her work on fossils in the Pilbara region of Western Australia.
Ms Allwood argued the oldest evidence of life on Earth is in Australia where a reef community formed 3.5 billion years ago.

There has been heated debate about whether layered sedimentary structures, ``stromatolites'', are fossilised micro-organisms or were formed by a non-biological process.

Ms Allwood said the 10km-long rocky outcrop, the Strelley Pool Chert, contain stromatolites displaying characteristics of younger reefs formed by micro-organisms.

"While stromatolitic structures have been identified previously in the area, no amount of close scrutiny seemed to yield conclusive evidence of a biological origin," Ms Allwood said.

"However our new study suggests that life not only existed way back then, but it was thriving, just waiting in the wings to flourish as soon as the right conditions emerged.

"This suggests life probably emerged much earlier, very soon after the planet formed.

"If life flourished so quickly on Earth, there's a good chance life could also have gained a toehold on Mars, even if it were habitable only briefly."