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Showing posts from September, 2019

Geological Society of America Annual Meeting, Phoenix

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Cultivated passionflower, L.H. Bailey Conservatory (Cornell University) I attended the Geological Society of America Meeting (GSA 2019) in Phoenix, Arizona, from September 21st to September 25th. Highlights included the Paleontological Society Short Course on Quantitative Methods in Phylogenetic Paleobiology, which I attended in order to brush up on my phylogenetics skills ( thanks to the organizers for a fantastic workshop); an open house hosted by Friends of Paleobotany at the Arizona State University Biocollections (again, thanks to the organizers!); and the Paleobotany and Terrestrial Ecosystems discipline section on Wednesday morning, during which I gave my presentation. My presentation this year was entitled " Passionflower-like seeds ( Passifloroidesperma ) from the Pliocene Gray Fossil Site of eastern North America and their biogeographic implications." (The abstract is here .) I hope to follow it up with a publication soon.

DEAL updates

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Diagram showing a cell engulfing the a cyanobacterium, the ancestor of the chloroplast. I have posted a two new land plant pages to the Digital Encyclopedia of Ancient Life! One of the pages describes the flowering plant life cycle and the evolution of the embryo sac (female gametophyte or megagametophyte) in angiosperms. The other discusses the origin of land plants, including theory and fossil evidence. To read more, follow these links: Angiosperm life cycle Origin of land plants