Scientists Say: Technofossil

Technofossil (noun, “Tek-no-FAH-sil”)

A technofossil is an object that could offer future archaeologists clues about our modern life.

A technofossil is not a true fossil. Real fossils are remnants of living things that have been preserved in Earth’s rock layers. Many experts say that to be considered a fossil, the object must be older than 10,000 years.

But many of the materials we use to make structures and gadgets today could persist for a long time. Concrete and metal, for example, are quite durable. People in the distant future might unearth things made of such materials and use them to learn about human society today. To those people, such objects would be technofossils.

Many technofossils might be made of plastic. This human-made material decays extremely slowly in nature. Most microbes cannot break it down. Plastics also hold up against water. That means, if buried, plastic objects may be preserved for thousands of years. Future archeologists could dig up anything from plastic beads from soaps to water bottles to toothbrushes. Other technofossils might include phones, laptops and other tech.

Technofossils will set the modern age apart from previous ones. Our current era in Earth’s history is unofficially known as the Anthropocene. Most experts put the start of this epoch at 1950. That’s when fossils formed from modern materials will look very different from those of the past, they argue.

In a sentence

Manufactured materials such as plastics and concrete may make modern-day fossils, or technofossils.

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