Determining the Color of Fossilized Feathers

Science Fridays

      I took a week off from my blog.  Last weekend I had an event to run, which turned out to be very productive and fun for the attendees.  We had living history workshops on things like basic skills, such as starting a fire with flint and steel, and cooking over an open fire; and we had training and safe use of black powder rifles and muskets, as well as safe operation of a cannon.  Besides this there were lectures on things like the history of the use of uniforms, and period correct clothing.  Amid all this we also had great fun.  
      Now on to this week's post for Science Fridays. 

      Researchers at Stanford University have discovered the color and patterns of the feathers of an ancient, extinct bird, the Archeopteryx.  Its feathers weren't just boring and monochromatic.  They were patterned, just like many modern birds.  Archeopteryx's feathers were light colored with dark edges and tips.
      They were able to pull of this feat of discovery by using the equipment at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory.  They were able to find chemical traces of the ancient "dino-bird" and its feather pigments.  They also examined their chemistry with an X-ray beam at SLAC's Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource.  
      Over a period of three years Phillip Manning, a palaeontologist from the University of Manchester, Uwe Bergman from SLAC at Stanford University, and Roy Wogelius, also from the University of Manchester led a team of researchers using this method to determine the chemicals leached into the surrounding fossilized rock by the bird's feathers.  This allowed them to get a clearer image of a creature that lived eons ago. 
      Brown University in Rhode Island also got into the game.  A team of researchers there announced last year that they had analyzed the melanosomes of a fossilized Archeopteryx feather.  They determined that the feather was trimmed in black.  

      This research turns some of the previous theories on their heads.  For one, now the colors have been determined - no more guessing on this subject.  Artist renditions in the past have shown every color imaginable.   Another thing that is amazing is that anything at all from the bird remains in the rock.  It was always assumed that nothing from the original specimen would remain after fossilization - that it would all have decomposed completely away before being replaced with minerals.  However, the trace metals that make up the pigments did indeed leach out into the surrounding rock. 
      Another Archeopteryx specimen, known as the Berlin Counterpart was also analyzed.  The chemical analysis yielded the same results.  By this the researchers know that their original findings are correct, and not just a naturally occurring impurity in the surrounding rock of the first specimen.  This second analysis stabilizes the research by showing consistency.