Earth is increasingly seeing the impact of human activity such as pollution and the depleting of natural resources through industrial actions and consumption.

But could our impact be so pronounced that we have actually pushed earth into a new geological phase of history?

Earth has been in the Holocene era since the end of the last ice age, 12,000 years ago.

Geologists and climate change experts believe we have now entered into the Anthropocene era.

To explain what the Anthropocene era is, Will Steffen, researcher and co-author of a paper on the topic joins Summer Breakfast.

Dig deeper: Adventures in the Anthropocene