Note to users. If you're seeing this message, it means that your browser cannot find this page's style/presentation instructions -- or possibly that you are using a browser that does not support current Web standards. Find out more about why this message is appearing, and what you can do to make your experience of our site the best it can be.

Science 1 June 2007:
Vol. 316. no. 5829, p. 1302
DOI: 10.1126/science.1137284
Prev | Table of Contents | Next

Brevia

Seawater Chemistry and Early Carbonate Biomineralization

Susannah M. Porter

The first appearances of aragonite and calcite skeletons in 18 animal clades that independently evolved mineralization during the late Ediacaran through the Ordovician (~550 to 444 million years ago) correspond to intervals when seawater chemistry favored aragonite and calcite precipitation, respectively. Skeletal mineralogies rarely changed once skeletons evolved, despite subsequent changes in seawater chemistry. Thus, the selection of carbonate skeletal minerals appears to have been dictated by seawater chemistry at the time a clade first acquired its mineralized skeleton.

Department of Earth Science, University of California at Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA.

E-mail: porter{at}geol.ucsb.edu

Read the Full Text


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Evolving mineralogy of cheilostome bryozoans.
P. D. Taylor, N. P. James, Y. Bone, P. Kuklinski, and T. K. Kyser (2009)
Palaios 24, 440-452
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Eve of biomineralization: Controls on skeletal mineralogy.
A. Yu. Zhuravlev and R. A. Wood (2008)
Geology 36, 923-926
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
The Ediacaran emergence of bilaterians: congruence between the genetic and the geological fossil records.
K. J Peterson, J. A Cotton, J. G Gehling, and D. Pisani (2008)
Phil Trans R Soc B 363, 1435-1443
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »


To Advertise     Find Products

Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)