The Rhynie Chert (Lower Devonian, Scotland) hosts a remarkably well-preserved early terrestrial ecosystem. Organisms including plants, fungi, arthropods, and bacteria were rapidly silicified due to inundation by silica-rich hot spring fluids. Exceptional molecular preservation has been noted by many authors, including some of the oldest evidence of lignin in the fossil record.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFossilised true ferns (Pecopteris sp.) preserved in siderite concretions from the Mazon Creek Lagerstätte (Illinois) presented a unique opportunity to characterise the organic signatures of these late Carboniferous plants. Localised analyses of true fern fossils showed several highly abundant phytohopanoids and fernane/arborane derived aromatic products, which were present only negligibly within their siderite matrix, as well as from other types of fossilised plants.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe reconstruction of ancient trophic networks is pivotal to our understanding of ecosystem function and change through time. However, inferring dietary relationships in enigmatic ecosystems dominated by organisms without modern analogues, such as the Carboniferous Mazon Creek fauna, has previously been considered challenging: preserved coprolites often do not retain sufficient morphology to identify the dietary composition. Here, we analysed = 3 Mazon Creek coprolites in concretions for dietary signals in preserved biomarkers, stable carbon isotope data, and macromolecular composition.
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