Paleontologists from Oregon State University and U.S. A team from the Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service has discovered a new genus and fossilized angiosperm species in Myanmar’s mid-Cretaceous amber deposits.
Valviloculus pleristiminisFlower sideways. Image Credit: Poiner, Jr. Et al., doi: 10.17348 / jbrit.v14.i2.1014.
New relic flower named Valviluculus pleristaminis, In its order of close kinship with the Monimiaceae and Atherospermataceae family belongs to the order of the L rails.
“It’s not quite a Christmas flower, but it’s a beauty, especially considering it was part of a forest that existed about 100 million years ago,” said Professor George Poiner Jr., lead author of the paleontologist at the Department of Integrated Biology. Oregon State University.
“The male flower is small, about 2 mm in diameter, but has about 50 stamens arranged in a circular motion, with the anthers pointing toward the sky.”
“The stamen consists of an anther (pollen-producing head) and a filament (a stem that attaches the anther to a flower).”
“Despite being so small, the rest of the detail is still compelling.”
“Our sample was probably part of a cluster on a plant that had many identical flowers, some possibly female.”
Valviloculus pleristiminis, the center of the flower in the apical view. Image Credit: Poiner, Jr. Et al., doi: 10.17348 / jbrit.v14.i2.1014.
Sample of Valviluculus pleristaminis Has an egg-shaped, hollow floral cup (the part of the flower from which the stamens protrude); An outer layer made up of six petal-like elements called tepals; And two-chamber anthers, with a pollen rug that opens through a side hinged valve.
It was encircled in amber at Gondwana Supermondant and stretched for about 45050 km across the sea from Australia to Southeast Asia. (, 000,000 miles) sank on the continental plate.
Geologists are debating when this part of the land known as the West Burma Block collapsed due to Gondwana.
Some scientists believe it was 200 million years ago; Others claim it was 500 million years ago.
“Since angiosperms evolved and diversified almost 100 million years ago, the western Burma block could not have broken up with Gondwana before that, far behind the dates suggested by geologists,” said Professor Poinner.
The discovery is described in a paper Journal of the Botanical Research Institute of Texas.
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G.O. Painar, Jr. Et al. 2020. Valviloculus pleristiminis General. Et sp. New., Flower of Laurelian fossils with valve anthers from mid-Cretaceous Myanmar amber. Journal of the Botanical Research Institute of Texas 14 (2): 359-366; doi: 10.17348 / jbrit.v14.i2.1014
