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Publications
Here you can find a compilation of the most interesting studies that we have published about the fossil remains studied in the project OLIGOlife.
Image: MicroCT, CENIEH, Burgos (Spain). Credits: B. Moncunill-Solé, CC BY-SA.
2025
Digital collection of the As Pontes remains
Many fossil remains from Galicia have been destroyed by industrial activities, while those that have survived are now scattered across various institutions and private collections. To ensure the preservation and conservation of these remains, the OLIGOlife project (ED431F 2023/36), funded by Xunta de
Galicia, aims to develop a digital repository of fossil remains from ‘As Pontes’. Read more.
2024
The As Pontes seeds and their conservation process
were key topics at a Spanish meeting
As Pontes seeds: "The analysis of sediments from As Pontes level F (Rupelian) has led to the recovery of a large number of fossil seeds in good preservation condition. Macro- and microscopic examination of the remains, using scanning electron microscopy and computed tomography, has allowed for a detailed analysis of the characteristics and internal condition of seeds that never germinated. Read more.
As Pontes conservation and restoration: "The As Pontes fossils were handled at an unknown date by personnel without training in conservation-restoration and submerged in an unidentified adhesive. As a result, the specimens are in poor condition and exhibit significant structural fragility, with fractures, powdering, friability, loss of cortical layers, and material loss that have compromised their mechanical stability, complicating their preservation and the study of the collection. The Conservation and Restoration Laboratory of the CENIEH has intervened in this paleontological collection following professional standards and developing a specific methodology for preliminary documentation and analysis, curative conservation and restoration processes, the creation of 1:1 molds and polychrome reproductions, as well as preventive conservation recommendations.". Read more.
2023
Oral communication: "The biota from As Pontes site"
The As Pontes basin (A Coruña, Galicia, Spain) was infilled by non-marine sediments during 7.3 My, recording swampy and lacustrine environments from the Rupelian (Oligocene) to the Aquitanian (Miocene), reaching up to 400 m in thickness nowadays. Magnetostratigraphic and palinological studies were developed in past decades, although its fossil record was just preliminary assessed. This site has yielded abundant –in some cases exceptionally preserved– vertebrate and plant fossils. Read more.
2022
OLIGOlife at the Galician paleontological congress
Several communications about the Oligocene As Pontes fossil remains were presented during
the 1st PaNOP meeting:
1. The ‘Tertiary’ palaeontological heritage from Galicia (NW Spain) [Oral Communication].
2. Understanding deterioration due to salt crystallization in plant fossils from Galicia (NW Iberian Peninsula) [Oral Communication].
3. New finding of Stratiotes fossil seeds in the Oligocene lignite from As Pontes basin, NW Spain [Poster].
Read more about them.
2021
The As Pontes fauna remains addressed in Europe
The As Pontes Basin is a 12-Km2 strike-slip fault basin developed in northern Galicia (north-western Spain). This basin, NW-SE oriented, is divided into two sub-basins. It was infilled by non-marine Tertiary deposits during 7 my (from late Oligocene to early Miocene), reaching up to 400 m in thickness. Sediments correspond to swampy and lacustrine facies associations in the center of the basin and to alluvial deposits in the margins. Read more.
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