Definition

Paleontology is the study of the history

of life on Earth as reflected in the fossil
record.
 Introduction

Fossils are the remains or traces of organisms

(plants, animals, fungi, bacteria and other
living things) that preserved in the crust of the
Earth.
 History

PRE-1750: PRE-SCIENTIFIC Descriptive phase dominant

PERIOD
Aristotle originated the type 1850-1900: MIDDLE
concept and made a crude SCIENTIFIC PERIOD
hierarchical classification of
organisms Darwin's theory of evolution
Noahan flood (for some people) More fossils became better known
accounted for fossils & extinctions -Vertebrate, Invertebrate,
Microfossils, Plants, 1st
1750-1850: EARLY paleontology textbook
SCIENTIFIC PERIOD
Fossils became recognized
correctly more often than before
 History

1900 to Mid-20th Century Mid-1900's to 2002: MODERN

PERIOD
Evolutionary histories of
invertebrate fossils documented
New & more sophisticated
practical applications of
Biological interest in fossils
paleontology
increased
Much more emphasis on
principles of paleontology
Chemical Analyses
Radio Carbon dating

Dendrochronology

Amino-acid
Racemization
Uranium Series
Dating
Cosmic ray dating
 In relation to Chemistry

"Dating," in a scientific context,

usually refers to any effort
directed toward finding the age
of a particular item or
phenomenon.

Fossils may be dated by

calculating the rate of decay of
certain elements.
 Cosmic Rays (radiation)

Forms C-14 C-14 combines with

oxygen to form carbon
Collision with
atmosphere (N14) dioxide (CO2)
 Radio Carbon Dating

Older fossils cannot be dated

by carbon-14 methods and
require radiometric dating

The best-known absolute dating

technique is carbon-14 dating, which
archaeologists prefer to use. However,
the half-life of carbon-14 is only 5730
years, so the method cannot be used
for materials older than about 70,000
years.
 Radio Carbon Dating

As soon as a plant or animal

dies, they cease the
metabolic function of carbon
uptake; there is no
replenishment of radioactive
carbon, only decay .

Beta decay happens at fixed

rate

Ratio of 12C - 14C is

measured
 Radio Carbon Dating

Accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) is a technique

for measuring long-lived radionuclides that occur naturally in
our environment. AMS uses a particle accelerator in
conjunction with ion sources, large magnets, and detectors to
separate out interferences and count single atoms.
 Tree-Ring Dating

Dendrochronology:
ology: the study of
chronos: time, or
more specifically
events in past time
dendros: using trees,
or more specifically
the growth rings of
trees
 Tree-Ring Dating

Each ring is a year of

growth

Each year has early wood

(light-colored) & late wood
(dark-colored)

As the cells get smaller,

their walls get larger and form
a distinct line between annual
growth of wood.
These lines (tree rings) allow
the age of the tree to be
established.
 How do we date tree-rings?

Do we simply count them?

No!
Trees are trickier than that, some
years they dont grow at all
This creates missing rings
Sometimes we just have part of a
tree, not the whole tree like the
violin
This is why we use pattern
matching & match sections of
growth with other trees
 Tree-Ring Dating
Crossdating

This is the technique of

matching rings within trees
from certain geographical
areas.

Distinctive rings, or
groups of rings form
markers which can be used
to match trees with
overlapping age ranges.
 Amino Acid Racemization Dating

All amino acids, except for

one (glycine), come in two
different forms known as the
levoratory (L - left) and
dextrorotary (D - right)
forms.

These two forms are called "enantiomers", "chirals", or

"stereoisomers", which basically means that they have the
same molecular and structural formula but cannot be
superimposed on each other no matter how they are
oriented in space.
 Amino Acid Racemization Dating

When creature dies, the L-

amino acids start to
spontaneously convert to the
D-form through a process
called "racemization"

The conversion of L-AA to D-AA is used to date the specimen.

Amino acid dating cannot obtain the age of the material purely from
the data itself.
Racemization dating must rely on other techniques such as Carbon 14
 Amino Acid Racemization Dating
Factors to be considered :

Temperature
Amino acid composition of the
protein
Water concentration in the
environment
pH (acidity/alkalinity) in the
environment
Contact with clay surfaces (catalytic
effect)
Presence of aldehydes, particularly
when associated with metal ions
Concentration of buffer
compounds
Ionic strength of the environment
 Cosmic Ray Dating

Cosmogenic nuclides are rare Cosmogenic nuclide dating is

nuclides that form in surface effective over short to long
rocks because of timescales (1,000-10,000,000
bombardment by high-energy years).
cosmic rays.

Principle: Cosmogenic nuclide dating uses the interactions

between cosmic rays and nuclides in glacially transported
boulders or glacially eroded bedrock to provide age estimates
for rock at the Earths surface.
 Cosmic Ray Dating
Cosmogenic nuclide formation
Cosmic rays interact with
atoms in the atmosphere
or (more rarely) the
crust to form cosmogenic
radionuclides.

Ex: 14C
formed
from 14N
 Cosmic Ray Dating
Principle: cosmogenic nuclides also created when high-energy particles
strike nuclei in rocks
- track their accumulation (predictable with t if you know the rock
chemistry, ie quartz,etc)
- can also compare the steady in-growth assumption against observed
profiles, obtain erosion histories
 Uranium Dating
Uranium-Series dating is
a radiometric dating
method based on the
decay of various uranium
isotopes, which decay Zircon

through a series of stages

to a stable lead isotope.

Principle:
Uranium-238 and uranium-235 decay in a series of stages to various daughter
elements with differing half-lives. Daughter isotopes present in the sample increase
through time and the ratio is measured to provide an age estimate. Most commonly
the ratio of uranium-238 to thorine-230 is measured.
 10Be, 26Al, and 36Cl Uranium Dating
* Measuring cosmogenic isotopes requires AMS (accelerator mass spectrometry), because they are
very
low in abundance compared to their stable counterparts (e.g. 12C is 1012 more abundant than 14C)

10Be 26Al & 36Cl

produced by interaction of cosmic rays with
O, N (most abundant atoms in
atmosphere), so production rate is
fairly large; also generated when
spallation products reach crust (O,
Mg, Si, Fe)
produced by interaction of cosmic rays with 40Ar;
also generated when spallation products reach
crust (O, Mg, Si, Fe)
26Al decays to 26Mg with t1/2=7.16e5y
36Cl decays to 36S and 36Ar with t =3.08e5y
1/2

10Be decays to 10B with t1/2=1.5e6y
readily adsorbed onto aerosols in
atmosphere, rained out, residence
time = 1-2 weeks in atmosphere
adsorbed onto clays in ocean; scavenged
readily adsorbed onto aerosols in atmosphere,
rained out
Al relatively immobile (like 10Be, locked in)
but Cl mobile geochemically (useful in
hydrlogical studies, groundwater ages, etc)
 Cosmic Ray Dating
Introduction to U, Th, and Pb

Element Charge Radius () Th and U are highly incompatible

U +4 (+6) oxic 1.05 and thus are concentrated
Th +4 1.10 in crustal materials and depleted
Pb +2 1.32 in mantle
Material U(ppm) Th Pb
Chondrites 0.01 0.04 1.0
Troilite .009 <.01 5.9
Basalt 0.43 1.6 3.7
Galena trace trace
HUGE
Zircon HUGE HUGE trace
Carbonates 1.9 1.2 5.6
Seawater (surface) 3 ppb 20 fg/g 2.7
pg/g
Seawater (deep) 3 ppb 60 fg/g 5 pg/g
U-Th-Pb decay chains
 Uranium Dating
U-Th-Pb governing equations

206
Pb 206
Pb 238
U t
204
204 204
(e 1)
Pb Pb i Pb
207
Pb 207
Pb 235
U t
204
204 204
(e 1)
Pb Pb i Pb
208
Pb 208
Pb 232
Th t
204
204 204
(e 1)
Pb Pb i Pb
After Smith and Farquhar (1989)
* Note that in all three decay schemes,
204Pb is used as a reference isotope If x=(238U/204Pb)m
And y=(206Pb/204Pb)m
We have y=b+mx
You can measure a date with all three
systems, and if those dates agree, Where intercept b=(206Pb/204Pb)i
then you have concordant dates. And slope m=(e t-1)
 Uranium Dating
Measurement
Measurement is of the alpha radiation of each element,
recognised by its characteristic frequency.
Thermal ionization mass spectrometry can also be used,
allowing for direct measurement of each isotope and higher
precision readings.
Limitations, sources of Error and
Accuracy
Depositional sequences in caves can be complex which can lead to
ambiguous results if the geology is not examined thoroughly to
allow for these possible areas of error. In many cases multiple
samples will be tested.
 NOTE:

Dating is Hard
especially when what
youre dating is Dead

-END