Age determination of fossils collected from Karabük, Safranbolu, Bulak river area by using amino acid racemization method

Abstract

Amino acids present in the proteins of living organisms are mostly in L forms at the time they are synthesized. Over a very long period of time after the death of living organisms, due to the effect of high temperature, pressure and other environmental factors a chemical transformation of L form to its enantiomer, D form occurs. This conversion reaction is known as racemization and it continues until D/L ratio is equal to 1. Thus, the age of any death body can be predicted by determining the D/L ratio of amino acids. The aim of this study is to determine the age of fossils collected from Karabük, Safranbolu, Bulak River area by using amino acid racemization method. Five fossil samples were used and D/L alanine ratios in the samples were used to determine their ages. As a result of the study it was observed that the age estimations by amino acid racemization method were quite lower than the age predictions during fossil identification step. The reason of this difference is thought to be related to the lack of data in the literature, which is used in constructing calibration curve