Anderson Landon A
Department of Biology, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA.
iScience. 2024 Jul 20;27(9):110538. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2024.110538. eCollection 2024 Sep 20.
Fossil bones have been studied by paleontologists for centuries. Despite this, empirical knowledge regarding the progression of biomolecular (soft) tissue diagenesis within ancient bone is limited; this is particularly the case for specimens spanning Pleistocene directly into pre-Ice Age strata. A nanoscopic approach is reported herein that facilitates direct imaging, and thus empirical observation, of soft tissue preservation state. Presented data include the first extensive nanoscopic (up to 150,000× magnification), three-dimensional (3D) images of ancient bone protein and vasculature; chemical signals consistent with collagen protein and membrane lipids, respectively, are also localized to these structures. These findings support the analyzed permafrost bones are not fully fossilized but rather represent subfossil bone tissue as they preserve an underlying collagen framework. Extension of these methods to specimens spanning the geologic record will help reveal changes biomolecular tissues undergo during fossilization and is a potential proxy approach for screening specimen suitability for molecular sequencing.
几个世纪以来，古生物学家一直在研究化石骨骼。尽管如此，关于古代骨骼中生物分子（软组织）成岩作用进展的经验性知识仍然有限；对于直接跨越更新世进入冰河时代前地层的标本来说尤其如此。本文报道了一种纳米级方法，该方法有助于对软组织保存状态进行直接成像，从而进行经验性观察。呈现的数据包括古代骨蛋白和脉管系统的首批广泛的纳米级（放大倍数高达150,000倍）三维（3D）图像；与胶原蛋白和膜脂分别一致的化学信号也定位于这些结构。这些发现支持所分析的永久冻土骨骼并未完全石化，而是代表亚化石骨组织，因为它们保留了潜在的胶原框架。将这些方法扩展到跨越地质记录的标本将有助于揭示生物分子组织在石化过程中所经历的变化，并且是筛选标本是否适合分子测序的一种潜在替代方法。
