![Applied Earth Science:IMM Transactions section B, 2003]()
Session 5 - Origin and evolution of life: evidence from ancient mineral: The Rhynie Chert early land plants: palaeo-ecophysiological and taphonomic analogues
Alan Channing
Applied Earth Science:IMM Transactions section B, 2003
Abstract
Current interpretation of the early evolution of land
plants is based on fossil plants preserved in exquisite
detail within siliceous sinter deposited by the activity of
terrestrial hot springs at Rhynie, Aberdeenshire,
Scotland during the Lower Devonian (e.g. Powell el al.3.
The Rhynie deposit's association with andesitic lavas and
tuffs, Au-As mineralisation, quartz-adularia-sericite
alteration assemblage and sinter deposits suggest that the
cherts are the surface expression of a low-sulphidation,
alkali-chloride hydrothermal system dominated by
meteoric waters (e.g. Rice and Trewin8)
NOTE: the article text supplied here is for educational purposes only.
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