Permian Feeding Remains: A Study of Bromalites from Bromacker (Thuringia, Germany)
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Bromalites — fossilised digested remains — are of high scientific value as they offer insights into the behavioural ecology and physiology of extinct organisms, including evidence of predator-prey interactions. These remains can be preserved either internally within body fossils (e.g., oralites, gastrolites, cololites) or externally, as separate entities (e.g., coprolites, regurgitalites). They are exceptionally rare, especially from Palaeozoic terrestrial deposits. The early Permian Bromacker locality in central Germany (Tambach Formation) yields outstanding fossilised vertebrate traces associated with skeletal remains. Here, we describe the first two bromalites from the Bromacker locality, identified as a regurgitalite (fossilised vomit) and a coprolite (fossilised faeces). Elemental mapping reveals differences of phosphorous concentration between the two bromalites, allowing a clear distinction between coprolitic and regurgitated remains. While the coprolite contains cranial and post-cranial elements of the small trematopid temnospondyl Rotaryus gothae, the regurgitalite preserves skeletal remains assignable to at least four different taxa: Eudibamus cursoris, Thuringothyris mahlendorffae, a diadectid and a dissorophoid. Based on their size and content, we hypothesise that these bromalites were most likely produced by a terrestrial apex predator, such as the sphenacodontid Dimetrodon teutonis or the varanopid Tambacarnifex unguifalcatus, previously recorded from the Bromacker locality. These findings provide new insights into the behavioural ecology and trophic structure of the Bromacker ecosystem and of terrestrial tetrapod ecosystems in general.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.005 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".