Pollen grains reveal oldest flowering plants - Spiegel Online

pollen grains can survive for millions of years as imprints in the rock. Swiss researchers found in drill core specimens that are 240 million years old. They show that there is already at least a hundred million years earlier than was previously believed flowering plants.

Peter Hochuli and Susanne Feist-Burkhardt of the University of Zurich found in drill cores in the north of Switzerland fossilized pollen, they specify their age with about 240 million years. They make their study in the journal “Frontiers in Plant Science” before.

flowering plants evolved from now-extinct plants that were related to conifers, ferns and cycads. When exactly caused the flowering plants is not known. The oldest finds of fossil pollen originated far from the early Cretaceous period, about 140 million years ago. Whether it previously gave flowering plants, has been controversial among experts.

pollinators were probably beetles

plant fossil record of pollen grains are common because they are small and robust and therefore easier to petrify than about leaves or flowers. The Swiss researchers now report findings in pollen cores from northern Switzerland, dating from the Triassic and are about 240 million years old.

They seem to confirm earlier controversial findings: In 2004, scientists had similar old fossil pollen found 3000 km further north in cores from the Barents Sea. The scientists hope their new findings to be able to convince very restrained experts expect that flowering plants have developed long before the beginning of the Cretaceous.

In the Middle Triassic both the Barents Sea and Switzerland were in the subtropics. The Swiss region was, however, very much drier than the region around the Barents Sea today. This put suggest that flowering plants have been inhabited different ecological landscapes, the researchers write. The pollen structure tends to suggest that the plants were fertilized by insects, probably from bugs.

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