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Fossils of organisms' bodies are usually the most informative type of evidence. The most common types are wood, bones, and shells. [59] Fossilisation is a rare event, and most fossils are destroyed by erosion or metamorphism before they can be observed. Hence the fossil record is very incomplete, increasingly so further back in time.
Amateur geology or rock collecting (also referred to as rockhounding in the United States and Canada) is the non-professional study and hobby of collecting rocks and minerals or fossil specimens from the natural environment. [1] [2] In Australia, New Zealand and Cornwall, the amateur geologists call this activity fossicking. [3]
Sedimentology: the study of sedimentary rocks, strata, formations, eustasy and the processes of modern-day sedimentary and erosive systems. Seismology : the study of earthquakes . Structural geology : the study of folds , faults , foliation and rock microstructure to determine the deformational history of rocks and regions.
Fossil collecting (sometimes, in a non-scientific sense, fossil hunting) is the collection of the fossils for scientific study, hobby, or profit. Fossil collecting, as practiced by amateurs, is the predecessor of modern paleontology and many still collect fossils and study fossils as amateurs. Professionals and amateurs alike collect fossils ...
The history of paleontology traces the history of the effort to understand the history of life on Earth by studying the fossil record left behind by living organisms. Since it is concerned with understanding living organisms of the past, paleontology can be considered to be a field of biology, but its historical development has been closely tied to geology and the effort to understand the ...
Tree remains that have undergone petrifaction, as seen in Petrified Forest National Park. In geology, petrifaction or petrification (from Ancient Greek πέτρα (pétra) ' rock, stone ') is the process by which organic material becomes a fossil through the replacement of the original material and the filling of the original pore spaces with minerals.
The discovery of a well-preserved fossil is helping researchers learn more about an iconic Jurassic-period species. The plesiosaur, considered a successful marine predatory ancient species, may ...
The discipline that studies the formation of fossil sites is the part of paleontology called taphonomy. [ 1 ] The term paleontological site is somewhat ambiguous and its use is more practical than scientific, so it can refer to localities in which several fossiliferous layers of different ages appear, whose study must be faced by clearly ...