Microbial structure / possible cyanobacteria — Conophyton sp.

Geologic period: Proterozoic

Age: Approximately 1 billion to 720 million years ago.

Feeding: Not applicable as an individual-body interpretation.

Body plan: Layered microbial-sedimentary structure rather than a single animal or plant body fossil.

Evidence: The Smithsonian identifies this Conophyton example as a stromatolite and explains microbial sediment trapping as the origin of the layers.

Why it matters: Stromatolites preserve evidence of ancient microbial ecosystems from long before animals dominated Earth.

Plain Language Identity: A stromatolite — a layered structure produced through interactions between microbial communities and sediment.

What You Are Looking At: Layered rock structure identified as Conophyton sp.

Preservation: Layered sedimentary structure.

Open Questions: The structure itself is evidence. Details of the individual microorganisms are reconstructed from stromatolite science rather than preserved as complete organisms here.

Source Urls: https://naturalhistory.si.edu/visit/virtual-tour/current-exhibits/deep-time-virtual-tour-fossil-list; https://www.si.edu/newsdesk/factsheets/david-h-koch-hall-fossils-deep-time

Enrichment Method: SAGE curated research pass; evidence separated from inference

Scientific name: Conophyton sp.

Evidence / representation: comparative_taxon_visual

comparative_taxon_visual

Reading Deep Time: How Rocks, Fossils and Time Become Evidence.

Media license: CC BY-SA 4.0

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/