engleski

Fossil shell preservation by fungal mineralization

Pliocene gastropods preserved by early mineral incrustation and direct evidence of fungal mediation in the formation of mineral envelope around the fossil carbonate shells is found. Material presented here were collected in Pliocene freshwater sands and clays of Lipovljani, western Slavonia, Croatia. The most delicate morphological structures of the gastropod shells, commonly were lost during fossil diagenesis because of extensive dissolution of the shell aragonite. Only occasionally shells were preserved with delicate aragonitic structures. One case of the preserved shell is presented here. Incrustation material were determined by XRD and EDS analisys as siderite and calcite.

Biomineralization; fossilization; fungi; environmental mineralogy

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