Direct chemical evidence for eumelanin pigment from the Jurassic period

@article{Glass2012DirectCE,
  title={Direct chemical evidence for eumelanin pigment from the Jurassic period},
  author={Keely E Glass and Shosuke Ito and Philip R Wilby and Takayuki Sota and Atsushi Nakamura and Clifford R. Bowers and Jakob Vinther and Suryendu Dutta and Roger Everett Summons and Derek E. G. Briggs and Kazumasa Wakamatsu and John D. Simon},
  journal={Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences},
  year={2012},
  volume={109},
  pages={10218 - 10223}
}
Melanin is a ubiquitous biological pigment found in bacteria, fungi, plants, and animals. It has a diverse range of ecological and biochemical functions, including display, evasion, photoprotection, detoxification, and metal scavenging. To date, evidence of melanin in fossil organisms has relied entirely on indirect morphological and chemical analyses. Here, we apply direct chemical techniques to categorically demonstrate the preservation of eumelanin in two > 160 Ma Jurassic cephalopod ink… 
View on NAS
pnas.org
163 Citations
Highly Influential Citations
10
Background Citations
59
Methods Citations
17
Results Citations
5

Figures from this paper

163 Citations

The Role of Melanin in the Biology and Ecology of Nematophagous Fungi

An overview of the different types of melanin is presented, with an emphasis on fungi, and the role of melan in the biology and ecology of nematophagous fungi is discussed.

Impact of diagenesis and maturation on the survival of eumelanin in the fossil record

Chemical characterization of pterosaur melanin challenges color inferences in extinct animals

Chemically characterize the melanin content of the soft tissue headcrest of the pterosaur Tupandactylus imperator by alkaline hydrogen peroxide oxidation followed by high-performance liquid chromatography and demonstrate the unequivocal presence of eumelanin in T. imperatorHeadcrest.

Multidisciplinary characterization of melanin pigments from the black fungus Cryomyces antarcticus

This work characterized the melanin pigment extracted from the Antarctic black fungus Cryomyces antarcticus, and demonstrated that, in spite of having a specific type of melanin as the majority of fungi, the fungus possesses the ability to produce both 1,8-dihydroxynaphthalene (DHN) and l 3-4 dihydroxyphenylalanine (L-DOPA) melanins, opening interesting scenarios for the protection role against radiation.

Molecular composition and ultrastructure of Jurassic paravian feathers

Sensitive molecular imaging is used to demonstrate that the filamentous epidermal appendages in a new specimen of the Jurassic paravian Anchiornis comprise remnant eumelanosomes and fibril-like microstructures, preserved as endogenous eumELanin and authigenic calcium phosphate, and unequivocally determine that melanosomes can be preserved in fossil feathers.

Elucidation of the hierarchical structure of natural eumelanins

Combining atomic force microscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) to compare intact eumelanosomes from four phylogentically distant species provides insights into the change in the eumalanin structure over the evolutionary history and enables the production of synthetic eumELanin with properties that are similar to natural eumElanin.

RAPID COMMUNICATION FOSSILIZATION OF MELANOSOMES VIA SULFURIZATION

Fossil melanin granules (melanosomes) are an important resource for inferring the evolutionary history of colour and its functions in animals. The taphonomy of melanin and melanosomes, however, is…

Chemical, experimental, and morphological evidence for diagenetically altered melanin in exceptionally preserved fossils

It is shown that melanin is preserved in a number of soft-bodied fossils, but its burial under high pressure and temperature for millions of years alters its original chemistry, and it is argued that experimental maturation of modern melanin samples replicates diagenetic chemical alteration of melanin observed in fossils.

Fossilization of melanosomes via sulfurization

The results reveal a high abundance of organosulfur compounds and non‐sulfurized fatty acid methyl esters in both the fossil tissues and host sediment; chemical signatures in the fossil tissue are inconsistent with preservation of phaeomelanin.

Bacteria or melanosomes? A geochemical analysis of micro-bodies on a tadpole from the Oligocene Enspel Formation of Germany

Many exceptionally preserved fossils have long been thought the product of preservation by bacterial autolithification, based largely upon the presence of, micron-sized, spherical or elongate bodies…
...

References

SHOWING 1-10 OF 42 REFERENCES

Trace Metals as Biomarkers for Eumelanin Pigment in the Fossil Record

Results show that trace metals, such as copper, are present in fossils as organometallic compounds most likely derived from original eumelanin, which provides a long-lived biomarker of melanin presence and density within a range of fossilized organisms.

Chemical degradation of melanins: application to identification of dopamine-melanin.

Alkaline H2O2 oxidation is useful in characterizing synthetic and natural eumelanins and that reductive hydrolysis with HI can be applied to analyzing oxidation products of dopamine such as neuromelanin.

Molecular taphonomy of animal and plant cuticles: selective preservation and diagenesis

  • D. Briggs
  • Environmental Science, Geography
  • 1999
It appears that the aliphatic components of many plant as well as animal fossils may be the result of diagenetic polymerization, which occurs even in amber, which encapsulates the fossil, eliminating almost all external factors.

The radioprotective properties of fungal melanin are a function of its chemical composition, stable radical presence and spatial arrangement

These findings and the laboratory observations of the resistance of melanized fungi to ionizing radiation suggest a role for this pigment in radioprotection, and it is hypothesized that theRadioprotective properties of melanin in microorganisms result from a combination of physical shielding and quenching of cytotoxic free radicals.

Structural coloration in a fossil feather

Investigation of feathers from the famous Middle Eocene Messel Oil Shale near Darmstadt, Germany shows that they are preserved as arrays of fossilized melanosomes, the surrounding beta-keratin having degraded, the first evidence of preservation of a colour-producing nanostructure in a fossil feather.

Melanogenesis in the ink gland of Sepia officinalis.

Findings allowed elaboration of an improved model of melanin formation in Sepia, which underscores the complex interplay of melanogenic enzymes and regulatory factors, highlighting both the similarities and the differences with melanogenesis in mammals.

Fossilization of feathers

There may be a significant bias in the avian fossil record in favor of inland water habitats because Preservation in terrestrial and normal-marine settings involves very different processes (in amber and in authigenically mineralized coprolites, respectively).

The physical and chemical properties of eumelanin.

A full understanding of melanin function, and indeed its role in retarding or promoting the disease state, can only be obtained through a full mapping of key structure-property relationships in the main pigment types.

Current challenges in understanding melanogenesis: bridging chemistry, biological control, morphology, and function

This review examines the current understanding of the initial chemical steps in the melanogenesis and focuses on the mixed melanin systems, with a critical eye towards understanding how studies on individual melanin do and do not provide insight in the molecular aspects of their structures.

Spectrophotometric characterization of eumelanin and pheomelanin in hair.

The results indicate that the A500 value can be used to quantify the total combined amount of eu- and pheomelanins, and the A650/A500 ratio can serve as a parameter to estimate the eumelanin/total melanin ratio.