Biostratinomy

Biostratinomy is the study of the processes that take place after an organism dies but before its final burial.

It is considered to be a subsection of the science of taphonomy, along with necrology (the study of the death of an organism) and diagenesis (the changes that take place after final burial).

However, if at least a few remnants of an organism make it to final burial, a fossil may eventually be formed unless destruction is completed by diagenesis.

William Schäfer's book "Ecology and palaeoecology of marine environments" is a classic product of this sort of investigation.

Briggs and colleagues have made detailed studies of decay with the prime aim of understanding the profound halt to these processes that is required by exceptional preservation in lagerstätten.