What science is studying the fossil remains of extinct organisms? Detailed analysis

In the article, we will examine which science studies fossil remnants of extinct organisms, what is the practical meaning of this and why their remains are generally preserved to the present day.

Ancient times

According to some estimates of scientists, life on our planet exists about 3 billion years, and it was replaced by a variety of biological species, ranging from bacteria and ending with algae in the ancient oceans. And water bodies, by the way, gave us life. Naturally, such changes have undergone and the plant world.

Even in ancient Greece and the Roman Empire, some researchers, finding the fossilized remains of plants and other organisms, guessed that the world is much older than it is commonly believed. True, they did not even suspect the true age of the finds, considering them to be the usual quirks of nature. Simply put, they did not realize that fossils are many millions of years old. And there was no way for them to study them in detail, except for an external examination.

In our time, such finds are very valuable for science, researchers on the basis of them learn a lot about the past epochs and periods. What science studies the fossil remains of extinct organisms, how do they survive millions of years after all? In this we will try to understand. This subject is very extensive and interesting, but we will dwell on the most important.

Paleontology

The science that studies the remains of extinct organisms is called paleontology. And scientists, respectively, paleontologists. But what's the point of analyzing fossil pieces? What in general can be determined from them?

The fact is that science as such does not pursue immediate and immediate benefits, its goal is a comprehensive study and knowledge, on the basis of which discoveries are subsequently made that are in practical use. For example, the theory of relativity, or rather its aspect of slowing down of time by gravity, was useful only during the launch of artificial satellites of the Earth. So now we know what science is studying the fossil remains of extinct organisms - this is paleontology.

Such studies help to understand how the flora and fauna of the world has changed and changed over millions of years, as well as supplementing Darwin's theory of evolution with new confirmative facts, which once and for all helped to understand the origin of new biological forms and reject the biblical assumption of divine intervention .

Also, analyzing the topic, which science studies fossil remains of extinct organisms, it is worth remembering that such studies are very important, including in order to prevent the possible extinction of living species and understand the further and possible path of evolution.

Study

But what can you learn by studying fossils? In fact, for a long time scientists were heavily constrained in the means, but then there were various methods of radiocarbon analysis that could provide answers to many questions. For example, the age of the finds, the composition of the food that the animals fed, and even the climate of their time! But how are they preserved?

Petrification

It's all about the process of petrification. It occurs when certain conditions condense, such as small access to oxygen, concealment from weather conditions, etc. Gradually, the biological material is, as it were, "impregnated" with mineral compounds and eventually turns into a kind of stone.

But, as a rule, a scientist who studies fossil remains of extinct organisms, can rarely find a complete and undamaged skeleton of a dinosaur or someone else, this is extremely rare, so you have to be content with what is. Nevertheless, even small remnants of material can shed light on ancient times and times.

Paleoanthropology

Also one can not fail to mention paleoanthropology. This discipline, which is part of paleontology, as the name suggests, deals with the research of our ancestors and in general all the once ancestral humanoid primates.

Now we know that fossil remains of extinct organisms are studied by science paleontology.