Opaline silica deposits on Mars may be good target sites where organic biosignatures could
be preserved. Potential analogues on Earth are provided by ancient cherts containing …

While the Apex chert is one of the most well-studied Archean deposits on Earth, its formation
history is still not fully understood. Here, we present Raman spectroscopic data collected on …

Demonstrating the biogenicity of carbonaceous microfossils can be relatively difficult
because of their small size and simple shape, and to the degradation of the associated …

Opaline silica was detected, with Raman spectroscopy, in carbonaceous microfossils
(especially Myxococcoides) in silicified filamentous microbial mats within dolomitized …

The current strategy for detecting evidence of ancient life on Mars—a primary goal of NASA's
ongoing Mars 2020 mission—is based largely on knowledge of Precambrian life and of its …

The search for indisputable traces of life in Archean cherts is of prime importance. However,
their great age and metamorphic history pose constraints on the study of molecular …

Phyllosilicate deposits on Mars provide an opportunity to evaluate aqueous activity and the
possibility that habitable environments may have existed during the Noachian period there …

Ancient geological materials are likely to be contaminated through geological times. Thus,
establishing the syngeneity of the organic matter embedded in a mineral matrix is a crucial …

Microfossils preserved in chert from the ̃1. 9 Ga Gunflint Formation (Schreiber Beach,
Ontario, Canada) were studied with transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and analytical …

Abstract The∼ 5.3–6.0 million-year-old evaporitic gypsum deposits of Cyprus and Crete
contain a variety of stromatolites that formed during the Messinian salinity crisis. We …