Time recording in bone microstructures of endothermic animals; functional relationships

Because they are mineralised, skeletal tissues can record and preserve indefinitely in their microstructures the expression of various constraints and especially the passage of time. Such traces of time can be either continuous or periodic (growth marks), but when deciphered they offer a powerful tool to reconstruct life history traits and even ecological conditions of time in extant as well as extinct species. Nevertheless, the temporal message ‘printed’ in skeletal tissues can be disturbed or even destroyed by various causes that need to be understood before this ‘biological chronometer’ can be accurately used.