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Book Cover
E-book
Author Gaines, Susan M., author

Title Echoes of life : what fossil molecules reveal about earth history / Susan M. Gaines, Geoffrey Eglinton, Jürgen Rullkötter ; scientific illustrations by Florian Rommerskirchen
Published New York : Oxford University Press, 2020

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Description 1 online resource (xviii, 355 pages) : illustrations (black and white), maps (black and white)
Summary In 1936 a German chemist identified certain organic molecules in ancient rocks and oils as the fossil remains of chlorophyll, presumably from plants that had lived millions of years in the past. Many years later this insight was revisited and the term biomarker coined to describe fossil molecules whose molecular structures could reveal the presence of otherwise elusive organisms and processesand then, the hunt was on. Echoes of Life is the story of those molecules and how they illuminate the history of the earth and its life. It is also the story of how a few maverick organic chemists and geologists defied the dictates of their disciplines and, at a time when the natural sciences were fragmenting into ever-more-specialised sub-disciplines, reunited chemistry, biology and geology in a common endeavor
Notes Previously issued in print: 2009
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Audience Specialized
Notes Description based on print version record
Subject Organic geochemistry.
Biomolecules, Fossil.
Biomolecules, Fossil
Organic geochemistry
Form Electronic book
Author Eglinton, G. (Geoffrey), author.
Rullkötter, J., author
Rommerskirchen, Florian, 1974- illustrator.
ISBN 9780197562253 (ebook)
0197562256 (ebook)