Elemental analysis of fossils using portable time-gated fluorescence spectroscopy and imaging

Techniques quantifying fossil chemistry to the parts per million level often require lab settings and destructive sampling. Non-destructive fluorescence imaging of fossils reveals previously unseen fossilized soft tissues relating to parts per million level fluorescence, but its sources remain unknown. Thus, there is a detection gap for in situ analysis of fossils in museum and field settings and when specimens cannot be destructively sampled. Time-gated spectroscopy can qualitatively detect certain elements in the parts per million range non-destructively in minerals, but its use on fossils has been limited. Here we describe first results from a portable, non-destructive spectroscopy and imaging system that bridges this detection gap in fossils. We discuss how this system can be used across paleobiology and in related fields like archaeology.