Review Material: Fossils of an organism.

A mold forms when the hard

part of an organism, such as a shell, is buried in
The Egyptian mummy isn’t a fossil for another sediment. Later, water carrying dissolved
reason. minerals may seep into the empty space of a
It’s not old enough. mold. If the water deposits the minerals there,
Fossils are prehistoric. the result is a cast, a solid copy of the shape of
Prehistoric means it comes from a time before an organism.
people could record their history.
Mummy comes from a time when people were Cast and mold are a type of fossilization where
recording their history, The mummy is not the physical characteristics of organisms are
prehistoric, so it isn’t a fossil. impressed onto rocks, especially coarse porous
Dendrite - of a type of mineral deposit rocks such as sandstones. Typically, the hard
The mineral manganese was dissolved in water. parts of an organism (e.g. shells of mollusks,
The water seeped into the rock. skeletal structures of coelenterates, bones and
Types of Fossils teeth of vertebrate, chitinous exoskeleton of
After an animal dies the soft parts of its body arthropods, trunks of trees, and many
rots away. This leaves the hard parts behind, sphenophyte) leave the best impression, because
such as the skeleton and over time this is buried they are usually composed of calcium carbonate,
by small pieces of rock. Over the years more and calcium phosphate, silica, or chitin, which
more pieces of rock, called sediment, form on provide a rigid structure and do not decay as
top and gradually the sediment around the easily. The rigidity of the hard body parts allows
skeleton compresses down and turns to rock. the sediment to form around the organism, as
The skeleton bones are then dissolved by water opposed to soft body parts which decay too fast
that washes through the rock and eventually the for impression to form as well as being too soft
bones are replaced by minerals in the water and for the mold to set.
the fossil is formed.
PERMINERALIZATION/PETRIFICATION – The fossilization process begins when the whole
PETRIFIED FOSSILS form when minerals organism or hard body part is trapped in
replace the structure of an organism. This sediments. Because most of these body parts are
process, called permineralization, occurs when typically composed of substances which are
groundwater solutions saturate the remains of soluble in carbonated water, this entrapment
buried plants or animals. As the water usually occurs in coarse and porous rock such as
evaporates the minerals remain, eventually sandstones. The porous nature of the rock
filling in the spaces left as the organism slowly enables the carbonated ground water to permeate
decays. and dissolve the original tissue leaving a detailed
MOLD - hollow area in rock in the shape of an mold of the organism.
organism/part of an organism. How does this happen?
All organisms are made of carbon.
The most common fossils are molds (cavity in When they are buried,
the rock) and casts, the materials that make up
the organism evaporates.
A fossilization process that producs copies of the These gases escape
shapes of ancient organisms, and contain details leaving carbon behind.
as to what they looked like. A mold is a hollow
area in rock in the shape of an organism or part
A Carbon Film is the film of carbon left on a were volcanic eruptions, all based on air, dust, or
rock by a decaying organism and is preserved as ash trapped in the ice. \
a fossil.
carbon film is an organism outline of a fossil Paleontologists find and study fossils all over the
(leaving only carbon) usually black, dark brown world, in almost every environment, from the
or light brown in color, depending on the type of hot desert to the humid jungle. Studying
rock they are pressed upon. fossils helps them learn about when and how
different species lived millions of years ago.
Trace fossils are a fossilized mark that is formed Sometimes, fossils tell scientists how the Earth
in soft sediment by the movement or actions of has changed
an animal.
A footprint provides clues about the size and By studying fossils, scientists can learn how
behavior, the speed, how many legs it walked much (or how little) organisms have changed as
on, lived alone or with others. life developed on Earth. There are gaps in
A trail or burrow can give clues about the size the fossil record because many early forms of
and shape of the organism, where it lived, and life were soft-bodied, which means that they
how it obtained food. have left few traces behind.
Egg fossils are the fossilized remains of eggs
laid by ancient animals. As evidence of the ossils are physical evidence of preexisting
physiological processes of an animal, egg fossils organisms, either plant or animal. Fossils of any
are considered a type of trace fossil. kind are useful in "reading the rock record,"
Casts that faithfully replicate the external form meaning they help us decipher the history of
of an organism provide paleontologists clues the earth. ... They can help us determine the
about the surface anatomy and behavior of an geologic age and environment (the
ancient organism. paleoenvironment) in which they were
deposited.
Paleontologist use fossils to try to provide
evidence of Earth's climate in the past. Fossils Fossils give us information about how animals
can also be used to learn about past and plants lived in the past. ... Some animals and
environments and changes in Earth's surface. plant are only known to us as fossils. By
For example, what did scientists think about the studying the fossil record we can tell how long
surface of the Earth when seashell molds and life has existed on Earth, and how different
casts were found on mountaintops? plants and animals are related to each other.
Ice cores are another thing that scientists use
to learn about Earth’s past environment even Fossils don't just show how living things have
though ice can’t be classified as a fossil because changed; they can also help us understand how
it was never alive. An ice core, which is a the Earth has changed. Over millions of years
tubular sample drilled from places like the polar the Earth's surface shifts and changes. For
ice caps, Antarctica, Greenland or glaciers, example, rocks that once formed the seafloor
shows the layers of ice and snow that have built might be forced up to form a mountain range.
up over thousands of years. Scientists can learn a
lot about ancient climates, including changes in What are some problems encountered when
temperature, CO2 concentration, and if there using the fossil record
What are the problems with the fossil record?
Explanation: Many fossil records are incomplete the layers that match. The rock layers on the top
because some animals were soft bodied or soft seem to form a valley but we can tell that Unit I
tissue which decays quickly. Also, due to (dark blue) on one side is the same as the Unit I
movement of tectonic plates, fossils are (dark blue) on the other side. There is missing
destroyed so there are many new fossilised rock in between and a displacement caused by
organisms which are destroyed and we don't deformation.
know about them. PRINCIPLES Of BIOLOGICAL SUCCESSION
Even though these two outcrops are separated by
Principle of Superposition a large distance, the same
In a series of sedimentary rocks the bottom layer rock layer can be correlated with the
is the oldest and the top layer is the youngest other because of the presence of the
Lower layers must be in place before younger same shark teeth. This lets scientists
rocks can be deposited on top of them states that know that the two layer were deposited
beds of rock on top are usually younger than at the same time, even if the surrounding
those deposited below. This is logical, consider a rocks look dissimilar from each other.
layered cake or a stack of books, you can’t add
another layer unless one already exists to begin PRINCIPLES OF CROSS-CUTTING
with. By understanding the Law of RELATIONSHIP
Superposition we can make general statements also helps us to understand the timing of events.
about the ages of these rock units.Consider these Younger features cut across older features.
top layers – Unit K (dark green) is younger than Going back to the fault on this image, we know
Unit J (burnt orange) because it lies atop it, this that these rock layers were involved in the fault
also directly relates to the relative age dating. movement because they are all offset. We can
PRINCIPLE OF ORIGINAL also determine which beds of rock were tilted
HORIZONTALITY and that relationship to the rocks that are not
suggests that all rock layers are originally laid tilted. The rock layers on the bottom have been
down (deposited) horizontally and can later be deformed and are now tilted. The rock layers on
deformed. This allows us to infer that something the top were deposited after the tilting event and
must have happened to the rocks to make them are again laid down flat.
tilted. This includes mountain building events,
earthquakes, and faulting. The rock layers on the
bottom have been deformed and are now tilted.
The rock layers on the top were deposited after
the tilting event and are again laid down flat.
PRINCIPLES OF LATERAL CONTINUITY
suggests that all rock layers are laterally
continuous and may be broken up or displaced
by later events. This can happen when a river or
stream erodes a portion of the rock layers. This
can also happen when faulting occurs. Faulting
causes displacement in rock units. The figure
here shows the offset between the layers
signified by the black line cutting across the
rocks. Trace the colors or letters across to find