title: Unravelling ancient microbial history with community proteogenomics and lipid geochemistry.
abstract: Our window into the Earth's ancient microbial past is narrow and obscured by missing data. However, we can glean information about ancient microbial ecosystems using fossil lipids (biomarkers) that are extracted from billion-year-old sedimentary rocks. In this Opinion article, we describe how environmental genomics and related methodologies will give molecular fossil research a boost, by increasing our knowledge about how evolutionary innovations in microorganisms have changed the surface of planet Earth.
authors.affiliation: Research School of Earth Sciences, and Centre for Macroevolution and Macroecology, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 0200, Australia. jochen.brocks@anu.edu.au
authors.forename: Jochen J
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Brocks
authors.forename: Jillian
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Banfield
mesh_terms: D001105:Archaea / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D001419:Bacteria / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D001426:Bacterial Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D018534:Earth, Planet; D004783:Environmental Microbiology; D005580:Fossils; D023281:Genomics; D006838:Hydrocarbons / Q000378:metabolism; D050356:Lipid Metabolism; D040901:Proteomics
chemical_list: D001426:Bacterial Proteins; D006838:Hydrocarbons