paleobiology

Paleobiology is the scientific study of the biology of ancient organisms, using fossil evidence to understand life in the past. It integrates biology, geology, and palaeogeography to infer anatomy, physiology, behavior, ecology, and life histories of extinct species. The field aims to reconstruct how organisms lived, how they grew, how they interacted with their environments, and how evolutionary processes shaped biodiversity over geological time.

Main sources include body fossils, trace fossils, and microfossils. Methods include comparative anatomy and functional morphology, growth and life-history analyses from bone histology and tooth wear, isotopic and chemical analyses for paleodiet and paleoclimate, phylogenetic reconstruction, and quantitative modeling. Chronologies are established through stratigraphy, radiometric dating, and biostratigraphy, enabling the placement of organisms within evolutionary timelines. Data from the fossil record are integrated with modern analogs to interpret physiology and ecology.

Subfields include paleoecology, paleobiogeography, paleoclimatology, paleophysiology, and macroevolutionary studies of diversity and extinction. Paleobiologists study changes in biodiversity through time, interactions among species, community structure, and responses to environmental change. The work informs debates about evolution, extinction dynamics, developmental constraints, and the limits of the fossil record. In practice, paleobiology combines fieldwork, laboratory analyses, and computational approaches.

Historically, the field grew from early natural history to modern integrated analyses using quantitative methods and large databases. Challenges include biases in preservation and sampling, incomplete records, and dating uncertainties. Ongoing efforts aim to standardize data and improve reconstructions of past life, using repositories such as fossil databases and open-data platforms to enable macroevolutionary studies.