Branco Weiss Fellow Since
2021
Research Category
Geobiology, Organic Geochemistry
Research Location
GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, Germany
Background
After almost 4 billion years of bacterial dominance, it took life on our planet just 250 million years to go from the proliferation of unicellular eukaryotes to diversification of animals. This sequence of rapid ecological and evolutionary changes is thought to be related to unprecedented environmental perturbations in ancient oceans and atmosphere, which occurred during this time interval and are recorded in sedimentary rocks. We know these perturbations did happen, but not their magnitude, duration, or driving mechanisms. Resolving this would help to understand not only where we all come from, but also where to search for complex life on other planets as we turn to the worlds beyond ours.
Details of Research
The history of life on our planet is recorded in rocks, but each rock scientists examine has accumulated for hundreds, or even thousands of years, and contains partially preserved remains of organisms that died there throughout all this time. Dr. Ilya Bobrovskiy combines the analysis of fossils, molecular fossils, and stable carbon isotopes in a series of new techniques that allow deconvolving biomarker and stable carbon isotope signals of ancient rocks. With this, Dr. Bobrovskiy is aiming to resolve paleobiology and paleoecology of the first ecologically successful eukaryotes, decipher the carbon isotope record associated with them, and ultimately better constrain the environmental controls on the origins of complex life on Earth.
