Devonian Landscape Heterogeneity Recorded by a Giant Fungus
| Title: | Devonian Landscape Heterogeneity Recorded by a Giant Fungus |
| Author: |
Hueber, Francis M.; Hazen, Robert M.; Cody, George D.; Fogel, Marilyn L.; Hotton, Carol L.; Boyce, C. Kevin; Knoll, Andrew Herbert
Note: Order does not necessarily reflect citation order of authors. |
| Citation: | Boyce, C. Kevin, Carol L. Hotton, Marilyn L. Fogel, George D. Cody, Robert M. Hazen, Andrew H. Knoll, and Francis M. Hueber. 2007. Devonian landscape heterogeneity recorded by a giant fungus. Geology 35(5): 399-402. |
| Access Status: | At the direction of the depositing author this work is not currently accessible through DASH. |
| Full Text & Related Files: |
Knoll_DevonianLandscapeHeterogeneity.pdf (318.9Kb; PDF) 
|
| Abstract: | The enigmatic Paleozoic fossil Prototaxites Dawson 1859 consists of tree-like trunks as long as 8 m constructed of interwoven tubes <50 mm in diameter. Prototaxites specimens from five localities differ from contemporaneous vascular plants by exhibiting a carbon isotopic range, within and between localities, of as much as 13%0 delta C-13. Pyrolysis-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry highlights compositional differences between Prototaxites and co-occurring plant fossils and supports interpretation of isotopic distinctions as biological rather than diagenetic in origin. Such a large isotopic range is difficult to reconcile with an autotrophic metabolism, suggesting instead that, consistent with anatomy-based interpretation as a fungus, Prototaxites was a heterotroph that lived on isotopically heterogeneous substrates. Light isotopic values of Prototaxites approximate those of vascular plants from the same localities; in contrast, heavy extremes seen in the Lower Devonian appear to reflect consumption of primary producers with carbon-concentrating mechanisms, such as cryptobiotic soil crusts, or possibly bryophytes. Prototaxites biogeochemistry thus suggests that a biologically heterogeneous mosaic of primary producers characterized land surfaces well into the vascular plant era. |
| Published Version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1130/G23384A.1 |
| Other Sources: | http://melts.geology.washington.edu/people/boyce_reprints/2007GeologyPrototaxites.pdf |
| Citable link to this page: | http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:3293011 |
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