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Updated: Jul 13, 2026

Sediment Core Sectioning and Extraction of Pore Waters under Anoxic Conditions
Published on: March 7, 2016
Seawater chemistry and early carbonate biomineralization
1Department of Earth Science, University of California at Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA. porter@geol.ucsb.edu
Abstract:
The first appearances of aragonite and calcite skeletons in 18 animal clades that independently evolved mineralization during the late Ediacaran through the Ordovician (approximately 550 to 444 million years ago) correspond to intervals when seawater chemistry favored aragonite and calcite precipitation, respectively. Skeletal mineralogies rarely changed once skeletons evolved, despite subsequent changes in seawater chemistry. Thus, the selection of carbonate skeletal minerals appears to have been dictated by seawater chemistry at the time a clade first acquired its mineralized skeleton.
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