Preservation of chitin in 25-million-year-old fossils

Science

Volumn 276, Issue 5318, 1997, Pages 1541-1543

  Stankiewicz, B Artur ^a   Briggs, Derek E G ^a   Evershed, Richard P ^a   Flannery, Matthew B ^a   Wuttke, Michael ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOL   (United Kingdom)

^b Referat Erdgeschichtliche D   (Germany)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

CHITIN;

ANALYTIC METHOD; ARTICLE; FOSSIL; INSECT; PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY; PRESERVATION; PRIORITY JOURNAL; PYROLYSIS;

CHITIN; INSECT; LACUSTRINE SEDIMENT; OLIGOCENE;

GERMANY, RHINELAND PALATINATE, WESTERWALD;

EID: 0030618012     PISSN: 00368075     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1126/science.276.5318.1541     Document Type: Article

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22. 2 before pyrolysis to eliminate contaminants. A quantity of each sample (0.05 to 0.005 mg) was pyrolyzed in a flow of helium for 10 s in a platinum coil at 610°C with the use of a Chemical Data System (Oxford, PA) 1000 Pyroprobe coupled to a Carlo Erba (Milan, Italy) 4130 gas Chromatograph (GC) with a Finnigan (Sunnyvale, CA) 4500 mass spectrometer (MS). Compounds were separated with a Chrompack (Middelburg, Netherlands) 50-m CP Sil-5 column (0.32-mm inside diameter and film thickness of 0.4 μm). The GC oven was operated as follows: isothermal at a temperature of 35°C for 5 min, with temperature programmed at 4°C per minute to 310°C, and then again at the isothermal temperature for 10 min. The MS was operated in full scan mode (35 to 650 dallons, 1 scan per second, 70 eV of electron energy). Peaks were identified on the basis of their mass spectral characteristics and GC retention indices; by comparison with authentic chitin, protein, and amino acid standards (15); and with reference to the literature (14).
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28. J. Carter and A. Gledhill (mass spectrometry facilities), S. Kearns (SEM), S. Powell (photography), and I. Duncan (modern insects) provided essential support, and we benefited from discussions with P. van Bergen and H. Poinar. M. Poschmann assisted with the collection of the samples. S. Wedmann identified the fossil insects. Supported by the Natural Environmental Research Council (NERC) grant GST/02/1027 to D.E.G.B. and R.P.E.; NERC also supported mass spectrometry facilities (grants GR3/2951 and GR3/3758). Collaboration between D.E.G.B. and M.W. was funded by the British-German Academic Research Collaboration program.