TY - JOUR
T1 - Coprolites of Late Triassic carnivorous vertebrates from Poland
T2 - An integrative approach
AU - Zatoń, Michał
AU - Niedzwiedzki, Grzegorz
AU - Marynowski, Leszek
AU - Benzerara, Karim
AU - Pott, Christian
AU - Cosmidis, Julie
AU - Krzykawski, Tomasz
AU - Filipiak, Paweł
N1 - Funding Information:
This project was primarily financed by MNiSW grant N N307 066040 (to MZ) and partly by the project No. 3941/B/P01/2009/36 (to GN). GN is currently funded by grant awarded to Per Erik Ahlberg (Uppsala University). The SEM facility at IMPMC was purchased owing to a support by Région Ile de France grant SESAME 2006 I-07-593/R . The work by JC and KB was funded by Simone and Cino Del Duca Foundation . Beamline 11.0.2 at the ALS is supported by the Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Division of Chemical Sciences, Geosciences, and Biosciences and Materials Sciences Division, U.S. Department of Energy , at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The authors thank Bernd R.T. Simoneit (Oregon State University) for help in identification of some polar compounds. Krzyszt of Szopa (University of Silesia, Sosnowiec) is thanked for carrying the EMP analysis for us. We would like to thank two journal referees, who wished to stay anonymous, for their very positive feedback, very careful reviews, many useful comments, remarks and corrections which helped to improve the manuscript.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2015 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2015/7/5
Y1 - 2015/7/5
N2 - Vertebrate coprolites derived from Upper Triassic terrestrial deposits of southern Poland have been subjected to various analytical methods in order to retrieve information about their composition, producer's diet and nature of the microscopic structures preserved in the groundmass. Morphologically, the coprolites have been classified into four morphotypes, of which only three were further analysed due to their good state of preservation. Their groundmass are composed of francolite, a carbonate-rich apatite, in which abundant coccoid structures are preserved. Based on various microscopic and organic geochemical techniques, they are interpreted as fossilized bacteria which could have mediated the phosphatization of the faeces. The thin sectioning revealed that the coprolites consist of those containing exclusively bone remains, and those preserving both bone and plant remains. Those coprolites preserving only vertebrate remains are suggestive for exclusive carnivorous diet of the producers. However, the interpretation of coprolites consisting of both vertebrate and plant remains is more debatable. Although they may attest to omnivory, it cannot be excluded that potential producers were carnivorous and occasionally ingested plants, or accidentally swallowed plant material during feeding. The latter may involve predation or scavenging upon other herbivorous animals. The potential producers may have been animals that foraged in or near aquatic habitats, such as semi-aquatic archosaurs and/or temnospondyls. This is supported by the presence of ostracode and other aquatic arthropod remains, and fish scales within the coprolites, as well as by the presence of specific biomarkers such as phytanic and pristanic acids, which are characteristic constituents of fish oil. The preservation of such labile organic compounds as sterols, palmitin, stearin or levoglucosan attests for rapid, microbially-mediated mineralization of the faeces at very early stages of diagenesis.
AB - Vertebrate coprolites derived from Upper Triassic terrestrial deposits of southern Poland have been subjected to various analytical methods in order to retrieve information about their composition, producer's diet and nature of the microscopic structures preserved in the groundmass. Morphologically, the coprolites have been classified into four morphotypes, of which only three were further analysed due to their good state of preservation. Their groundmass are composed of francolite, a carbonate-rich apatite, in which abundant coccoid structures are preserved. Based on various microscopic and organic geochemical techniques, they are interpreted as fossilized bacteria which could have mediated the phosphatization of the faeces. The thin sectioning revealed that the coprolites consist of those containing exclusively bone remains, and those preserving both bone and plant remains. Those coprolites preserving only vertebrate remains are suggestive for exclusive carnivorous diet of the producers. However, the interpretation of coprolites consisting of both vertebrate and plant remains is more debatable. Although they may attest to omnivory, it cannot be excluded that potential producers were carnivorous and occasionally ingested plants, or accidentally swallowed plant material during feeding. The latter may involve predation or scavenging upon other herbivorous animals. The potential producers may have been animals that foraged in or near aquatic habitats, such as semi-aquatic archosaurs and/or temnospondyls. This is supported by the presence of ostracode and other aquatic arthropod remains, and fish scales within the coprolites, as well as by the presence of specific biomarkers such as phytanic and pristanic acids, which are characteristic constituents of fish oil. The preservation of such labile organic compounds as sterols, palmitin, stearin or levoglucosan attests for rapid, microbially-mediated mineralization of the faeces at very early stages of diagenesis.
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U2 - 10.1016/j.palaeo.2015.04.009
DO - 10.1016/j.palaeo.2015.04.009
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84928674489
SN - 0031-0182
VL - 430
SP - 21
EP - 46
JO - Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology
JF - Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology
ER -