The DOI matches its Crossref record; 60 of the 61 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Archean tufted microbial mats and the Great Oxidation Event: new insights into an ancient problem
Abstract
The macroscopic fossil record of the Archean consists solely of stromatolites and other microbialites, which seldom offer compelling clues to the identities of the organisms that formed them. Tufted microbial mats are an exception because their formation is known to require a suite of morphological and behavioural characteristics from which the behavioural and biological affinities of early microbialite-constructing microbes can be inferred. Here, the oldest yet reported convincing fossil tufted microbial mats are described and discussed in the context of other ancient and modern examples. Significantly, cyanobacteria dominate all known modern occurrences and may also have been the builders of ancient examples, the oldest of which predate by several hundred million years the earliest convincing cyanobacterial microfossils and most geochemical evidence for an oxygenated atmosphere.
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“Light organic carbon isotopes and structures like those made by filamentous cyanobacteria found within stromatolites or other microbially induced sedimentary structures are consistent with cyanobacteria by 3.2 to 2.7 Ga ago (91–94).”
From The Archean atmosphere (2020) · cites this paper as [93]
Citations
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1 of the 61 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.
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Metadata
- Authors
- Flannery, D. T., & Walter, M. R.
- Affiliations
- UNSW Sydney (AU)
- Corresponding author
- Flannery, D. T.
- ORCID
- Flannery, D. T.
- Venue
- Australian Journal of Earth Sciences
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2012-02
- Volume
- 59
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 1-11
- ISSN
- 0812-0099 (ISSN-L)
- 1440-0952
- OpenAlex
- W2015336292
- Cited by
- 113
- References
- 61
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 2 · 2021: 8 · 2020: 7 · 2019: 8 · 2018: 13 · 2017: 8 · 2016: 10 · 2015: 14 · 2014: 8 · 2013: 11 · 2012: 6
- FWCI
- 5.76
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Australian Journal of Earth Sciences (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- University of New South Wales
- Australian Research Council
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Paleontology › Paleontology and Stratigraphy of Fossils
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Origins and Evolution of Life
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Paleontology › Paleontology and Evolutionary Biology
- Keywords
- Archean, Great Oxidation Event, stromatolites, microbialites, cyanobacteria
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