Evolution: plant blooms pushed further back (Introduction)

by David Turell , Monday, January 17, 2022, 15:12 (1040 days ago) @ David Turell

New discoveries in China:

https://www.sciencealert.com/researchers-have-found-the-oldest-flower-bud-fossil-yet?ut...

Scientists in China say they have found the oldest flower bud in the fossil record, finally aligning the fossil evidence with the genetic data suggesting flowering plants, or angiosperms, evolved tens of millions of years earlier than we initially thought. (my bold)

The team hopes their discovery will help "ease the pain" around a nagging, centuries-old mystery that Charles Darwin once called "abominable".

If the oldest unambiguous fossil flower is no older than 130 million years old, then how come angiosperms began to dominate ecosystems just 20 to 30 million years later? How had they evolved such great diversity that quickly?

It was a puzzle that had bothered Darwin greatly, but he never found the answers he wanted. In the past few years, however, some crucial pieces have fallen into place.

In 2016, scientists in China announced the discovery of a "perfect flower" dating back to the Jurassic, more than 145 million years ago.

The fossilized plant, called Euanthus, not only had petals, but it also had sepals (the leafy bit at the base of a bud), as well male and female reproductive parts, including an ovary similar to modern flowers.

In 2018, another fossilized flower was found in China, and this one, called Nanjinganthus, was about 174 million years old. Like a modern flowering plant, its seeds were completely enclosed in an ovary.

***
The new fossilized flower bud, found in China and dubbed Florigerminis jurassica, could be the transitional stage researchers have been looking for. It was found at a deposit dated more than 164 million years ago, and it's still in excellent condition.

***

Because flowers are such delicate structures, they are notoriously difficult to find in fossils preceding the Cretaceous. Previous attempts to uncover the origin of flowering plants have been described as an "unbroken record of failure". (my bold)

F. jurassica is a one-of-a-kind discovery. Not even Nanjinganthus has been found with an intact flower bud, just a flower.

The fruit on F. jurassica adds even more support to the idea that this is, in fact, an early angiosperm, and not a gymnosperm.

Comment: Darwin's mystery is not solved as this is a still a sudden sudden appearance but the article makes two important statements I've bolded. The first shows the maths predicting genetic age work. The second speaks to dhw's constant complaint that gaps are missing fossils. Delicate plant fossils are yielding to current searches in new levels of older age, explaining why those they have finally been found. In comparison, animal evolution with many more preserved fossils, easy to find, have established unchanging gaps. We still have fact there are huge gaps in evolution supporting the need to recognize a designer at work.