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Photosynthetic alga. comparative_taxon_visual
OBJECT DOSSIER · SMITHSONIAN OPEN ACCESS

Photosynthetic alga — Grypania sp.

SAGE Museum Deep Time scientific dossier
Artist / Creator
James St. John
Date / Period
Precambrian — Early Proterozoic (Smithsonian catalog terminology) · Early Proterozoic; the cited Smithsonian catalog record does not provide a numeric age.
Object Type
algal fossil
Medium
original_fossil
About This Object

Geologic period: Precambrian — Early Proterozoic (Smithsonian catalog terminology)

Age: Early Proterozoic; the cited Smithsonian catalog record does not provide a numeric age.

Feeding: Not directly preserved.

Evidence: Smithsonian catalog identification, stratigraphic placement and specimen morphology.

Why it matters: Grypania helps show that large visible biological structures existed long before abundant complex animal life.

Plain Language Identity: Large coiled Proterozoic fossil interpreted in the Smithsonian exhibit as a photosynthetic alga.

What You Are Looking At: A fossil assigned to Grypania sp., preserved in rocks of the Negaunee Iron Formation.

Formation: Negaunee Iron Formation

Find Location: Michigan, United States

Preservation: Fossil specimen; exact preservation mode is not stated in the cited catalog entry.

Open Questions: Detailed physiology, behavior and cellular organization cannot be established from this specimen alone.

Source Urls: https://naturalhistory.si.edu/visit/virtual-tour/current-exhibits/deep-time-virtual-tour-fossil-list; https://www.si.edu/object/nmnhpaleobiology_3339482

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

Scientific name: Grypania sp.

Evidence / representation: comparative_taxon_visual

Why It Is In This SAGE Exhibit

comparative_taxon_visual

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

Provenance
Smithsonian Deep Time source scene: What is Life?
Visual source institution: Wikimedia Commons
Exhibition History
Included in the SAGE Museum Dinosaurs & Deep Time staging exhibit.
Collection & Credit

Media license: CC BY 2.0

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

Subjects & Themes
Grypania sp. Precambrian — Early Proterozoic (Smithsonian catalog terminology) algal fossil What is Life? Reading Deep Time
ORIGINAL COLLECTION SOURCE

This object page stays inside SAGE Museum. The Smithsonian link below is provided only as the original scholarly collection record. It opens separately.

VIEW ORIGINAL SMITHSONIAN RECORD ↗