Runcaria, a middle devonian seed plant precursor

Science

Volumn 306, Issue 5697, 2004, Pages 856-858

  Gerrienne, P ^a   Meyer Berthaud, B ^b   Fairon Demaret, M ^a   Street, M ^a   Steemans, P ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF LIÈGE   (Belgium)

^b CIRAD   (France)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

DATA ACQUISITION; LIVING SYSTEMS STUDIES; PLANTS (BOTANY);

LIVING SPECIES; PLANT LINAGE; RUNCARIA;

SEED;

DEVONIAN; EVOLUTION; PALEOBOTANY; SEED PRODUCTION;

ARTICLE; INTEGUMENT; PLANT; PLANT MORPHOLOGY; PLANT REPRODUCTION; PLANT SEED; POLLINATION; PRIORITY JOURNAL; RUNCARIA HEINZELINII; SPORANGIUM;

BELGIUM; EVOLUTION; FOSSILS; PLANT COMPONENTS; PLANT PHYSIOLOGY; PLANTS; POLLEN; SEEDS; TIME;

DATA PROCESSING; PLANTS; POLLINATION; SEEDS;

BELGIUM; BENELUX; EASTERN HEMISPHERE; EURASIA; EUROPE; WESTERN EUROPE; WORLD;

ENTOVALVA; SPERMATOPHYTA;

EID: 7444228133     PISSN: 00368075     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1126/science.1102491     Document Type: Article

References (28)

1. G. W. Rothwell, D. M. Erwin, Am. J. Bot. 74, 970 (1987).
2. G. W. Rothwell, R. Serbet, Syst. Bot. 19, 443 (1994).
3. C. B. Beck, D. C. Wight, in Origin and evolution of Gymnosperms, C. B. Beck, Ed. (Columbia Univ. Press, New York, 1988), pp. 1-84.
4. W. G. Chaloner, A. J. Hill, W. S. Lacey, Nature 265, 233 (1977).
5. J. Galtier, N. P. Rowe, Nature 340, 225 (1989).
6. W. A. DiMichele, J. I. Davis, R. G. Olmstead, Taxon 38, 1 (1989).
7. R. M. Bateman, W. A. DiMichele, Biol. Rev. 69, 345 (1994).
8. G. W. Rothwell, S. E. Scheckler, W. H. Gillespie, Bot. Gaz. 150, 170 (1989).
9. M. Fairon-Demaret, S. E. Scheckler, Bull. Inst. R. Sci. Nat. Belg. 57, 183 (1987).
10. M. Fairon-Demaret, Rev. Palaeobot. Palynol. 93, 217 (1996).
11. G. W. Rothwell, S. E. Scheckler, in Origin and Evolution of Gymnosperms, C. B. Beck, Ed. (Columbia Univ. Press, New York, 1988), pp. 85-134.
12. J. Hilton, D. Edwards, Rev. Palaeobot. Palynol. 93, 235 (1996).
13. J. Hilton, Acta Bot. Sin. 40, 981 (1998).
14. J. E. A. Marshall, A. R. Hemsley, Palaeontology 46, 647 (2003).
15. A. D. Arkhangelskaya, E. Turnau, Rev. Palaeobot. Palynol. 127, 45 (2003).
16. F. Stockmans, Inst. R. Sci. Nat. Belg. Mem. 159, 1 (1968).
17. M. Streel, K. Higgs, S. Loboziak, W. Riegel, P. Steemans, Rev. Palaeobot. Palynol. 50, 211 (1987).
18. Runcaria heinzelinii Stockmans, 1968. Holotype (fig. S4): specimen number IRSnB104,866, housed at the Institut Royal des Sciences Naturelles de Belgique (Brussels, Belgium). Emended diagnosis, descriptio generico-specifica: Cupules borne in pairs, each on a short stalk up to 3 mm in length and 0.4 mm in diameter. Stalks resulting from a ∼70° isotomy of the fertile axis. Cupule containing one 6.5- to 8-mm-long integumented indehiscent megasporangium. Cupule comprising four segments free from each other, 1.6 to 3 mm long and 1.1 to 1.7 mm wide, curved outward and separated distally in two bluntly pointed tips. Lateral edges of cupule segments decurrent along the stalk. Megasporangium radially symmetrical, surrounded by a 4.7- to 5.2-mm-long divided integument. Megasporangium comprising a sessile oval body 1.4 to 2 mm long and 0.9 to 1.3 mm wide, bearing a distal extension, 4 to 5.2 mm long and 0.2 to 0.4 mm wide, emerging above the integument. Tip of megasporangial extension unopened and enlarged, up to 470 μm wide and 780 μm long. Integument separated into a minimum of 16 lobes free from each other and from the megasporangium down to their base. Integument lobes 75 to 100 μm wide, comprising elongate thickened cells and separated by intervals up to 100 μm wide; lobes converging distally around the columnar extension at about four-fifths of its length.
19. A. R. Hemsley, Palaeontogr. B 229, 13S (1993).
20. C.-S. Li, J. Hilton, A. R. Hemsley, Bot. J. Linn. Soc. 123, 133 (1997).
21. N. P. Rowe, Palaeontology 40, 575 (1997).
22. D. Haig, M. Westoby, Biol. J. Linn. Soc. 38, 215 (1989).
23. K. J. Niklas, Plant Biomechanics: An Engineering Approach to Plant Form and Function (Univ. of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1992).
24. P. S. Soltis, D. E. Soltis, V. Savolainen, P. R. Crane, T. G. Barraclough, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 99, 4430 (2002).
25. The listed ages are those calculated by Soltis et al. (24) for node 24 in table 6 (nonparametric rate smoothing analysis) when using calibration points within the same stem group (lignophytes) as Runcaria.
26. R. D. Tucker et al., Earth Planet. Sci. Lett. 158, 175 (1998).
27. B. Kaufmann, E. Trapp, K. Mezger, J. Geol. 112, 495 (2004).
28. We thank N. Rowe, B. Kaufmann, and D. Dilcher for critical reading of the manuscript and F. Damblon for the loan of the specimen. P.G. and P.S. are Fonds National par la Recherche Scientifique (FNRS) research associates. B.M-B. is a Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) researcher.