Experimental subaqueous burial of a bird carcass and compaction of plumage.

ABSTRACT: 'Exceptional fossils' of dinosaurs preserving feathers have radically changed the way we view their paleobiology and the evolution of birds. Understanding how such soft tissues preserve is imperative to accurately interpreting the morphology of fossil feathers. Experimental taphonomy has been integral to such investigations. One such experiment used a printing press to mimic compaction, done subaerially and without sediment burial, and concluded that the leaking of bodily fluid could lead to the clumping of feathers by causing barbs to stick together such that they superficially resemble simpler, less derived, filamentous structures. Here we use a novel, custom-built experimental setup to more accurately mimic subaqueous burial and compaction under low-energy, fine-grain depositional envir

SUBMITTER: Saitta ET 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6244563 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature