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Johan Lindgren

Johan Lindgren

Senior lecturer

Johan Lindgren

Interpreting melanin-based coloration through deep time: a critical review.

Author

  • Johan Lindgren
  • Alison Moyer
  • Mary Higby Schweitzer
  • Peter Sjövall
  • Per Uvdal
  • Dan-E Nilsson
  • Jimmy Heimdal
  • Anders Engdahl
  • Johan Gren
  • Bo Pagh Schultz
  • Benjamin P Kear

Summary, in English

Colour, derived primarily from melanin and/or carotenoid pigments, is integral to many aspects of behaviour in living vertebrates, including social signalling, sexual display and crypsis. Thus, identifying biochromes in extinct animals can shed light on the acquisition and evolution of these biological traits. Both eumelanin and melanin-containing cellular organelles (melanosomes) are preserved in fossils, but recognizing traces of ancient melanin-based coloration is fraught with interpretative ambiguity, especially when observations are based on morphological evidence alone. Assigning microbodies (or, more often reported, their 'mouldic impressions') as melanosome traces without adequately excluding a bacterial origin is also problematic because microbes are pervasive and intimately involved in organismal degradation. Additionally, some forms synthesize melanin. In this review, we survey both vertebrate and microbial melanization, and explore the conflicts influencing assessment of microbodies preserved in association with ancient animal soft tissues. We discuss the types of data used to interpret fossil melanosomes and evaluate whether these are sufficient for definitive diagnosis. Finally, we outline an integrated morphological and geochemical approach for detecting endogenous pigment remains and associated microstructures in multimillion-year-old fossils.

Department/s

  • Lithosphere and Biosphere Science
  • Chemical Physics
  • Functional zoology
  • MAX IV Laboratory
  • Lund Vision Group

Publishing year

2015

Language

English

Publication/Series

Royal Society of London. Proceedings B. Biological Sciences

Volume

282

Issue

1813

Document type

Journal article review

Publisher

Royal Society Publishing

Topic

  • Evolutionary Biology
  • Geosciences, Multidisciplinary

Status

Published

Research group

  • Lund Vision Group

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1471-2954