loading page

Precambrian Microbial Mats and its Astrobiological Implications
  • Anuj Soni,
  • Priyabrata Das
Anuj Soni
Spaceonova Private Limited, India

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

Author Profile
Priyabrata Das
Spaceonova Private Limited, India
Author Profile

Abstract

It is now understood that if life had ever erose on Mars, it might have been preserved in the simplest form. Therefore, studying the traces of simple life forms from the rock records of various Earth environments and climatic conditions perhaps helps to narrow down the region of interest while searching for life on the red planet. The Precambrian era covered almost 80% of Earth’s geologic history, witnessed the appearance of life on Earth and experienced prolonged extreme climatic events that delayed biological evolution. During this extreme period, primitive lifeforms such as microbial mats had a strong influence on sedimentation, and they facilitated the formation of a variety of mat-induced sedimentary structures (MISS) in siliciclastic and carbonate sedimentary environments. In the last two decades MISS have been identified from several Precambrian successions of India for example, Vindhyan, Marwar, Chhattisgarh and, Cuddapah Supergroup. In this study we tried to provide an updated catalogue based on the chronologic, stratigraphic and paleoenvironmental occurrences of MISS from the Indian Precambrian successions. We further explore their potential in understanding extreme habitability, searching biomarkers and biosignatures on Mars and propose a few potential sites for astrobiological research.