Imagine the thrill of peering into deep time, only to find a fossil within a fossil — a silent, stone-etched echo of life ...

The study, published online today in Science, is the first to map the distribution of trace metals in fossils as a way to reconstruct pigment patterns. The findings suggest that pigment chemistry may ...

One specimen showed a parasitic mussel larva attached to its tail fin—the first fossil record of this relationship. The distribution of preserved pigment cells indicated counter-shading ...

The fossils of the new species ... the unexpected discovery of fossilized pigment cells called melanophores allowed the researchers to determine what color the fish might have been.

Scientists at the University of Manchester used a combination of X-ray spectroscopy techniques to examine three key specimens of Archaeoptryx fossils and found trace-metals that have been shown to be ...