Hermsen Lab

  I attended the Midcontinent Paleobotanical Colloquium at the Oak Spring Garden Foundation in Virginia from May 6th to 7th to present the talk "Seeds of Passiflora  subgenus Decaloba  from the early Pliocene Gray Fossil Site of Tennessee." 

  I gave a virtual presentation for the Atlanta Botanical Garden's Science Café on September 16, 2021. The video can be viewed on their website or on YouTube. Thanks to Atlanta Botanical Garden for the invitation and to everyone who attended! YouTube link:  https://youtu.be/z5pARaEXWpM

Title for my Botany 2020 presentation I attended the Botany 2020 virtual conference, where I presented a talk on fossil passionflower seeds from Gray Fossil Site. I also coauthored a poster on the phylogeny of fossil and living mosquito ferns. The talks and links to the abstracts are below: Hermsen, E.J.*  2020. Fossil  Passiflora  seeds from Gray Fossil Site (Pliocene, Tennessee, U.S.A.).  Link to abstract Jud, N.*, F. De Benedetti,  E.J. Hermsen , and M. Gandolfo. 2020. Estimating the phylogeny of  Azolla : a comparison between analysis of morphology and molecular data with and without tip-dating. [Poster]  Link to abstract

I was featured on episode 5 of Paleo Talks, speaking on the subject of Gray Fossil Site plants. The full episode is now available on YouTube: https://youtu.be/UyLfhJHSzWQ

Image of a chambered nautilus by J.R. Hendricks from DEAL A presentation on the Digital Encyclopedia of Ancient Life (DEAL) was given at the Geological Society of America Annual Meeting in Indianapolis, Indiana, by Dr. Jonathan R. Hendricks. The DEAL continues to expand, with a new chapter on cephalopods recently released! Work on the land plant chapter has commenced, although none of the plant pages are available yet. Stay tuned for updates. Abstract:  Hendricks, J.R.,  E.J. Hermsen , and E. Hauf. 2018. The Digital Encyclopedia of Ancient Life (DEAL): An open access paleontology textbook. Geological Society of America Annual Meeting, Indianapolis, Indiana (talk). doi:10.1130/abs/2018AM-318607.  LINK Related links: DEAL main page DEAL Cephalopoda chapter by J.R. Hendricks Virtual teaching collection on Sketchfab  (models by E. Hauf)

Modern Azolla  sporophytes, cultivated The Botany 2018 meeting was held from July 21-25 in Rochester Minnesota. I was involved in two projects presented at the meeting: " Taxonomic composition of the Neogene Gray Fossil Site carpoflora (Tennessee, USA) " was presented and authored by E.J. Hermsen. " An organismal concept for fossil  Azolla  from the early Paleocene (Danian) Salamanca Formation, Patagonia, Argentina " was presented by Nathan A. Jud (Cornell University) and authored by Jud, F. De Benedetti (Museo Paleontológico Egidio Feruglio), E.J. Hermsen, and M.A. Gandolfo (Cornell). It was part of the colloquium  " Fossil plants at the intersection of evo-devo and phylogeny: Celebrating the contributions of Gar W. Rothwell to biodiversity and evolution ."

Cedar Falls, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio The 35th Midcontinent Paleobotanical Colloquium took place in Athens, Ohio, from June 1-3, 2018. Scientific presentations took place in Porter Hall on the Athens campus on June 2nd. Dr. Kathleen Pigg of Arizona State University opened the scientific session with a keynote presentation on "Forty years of fun with paleobotany." This presentation was followed by 14 contributed talks. The Hermsen lab was represented by three speakers: Zack Quirk, who gave a presentation entitled "Neogene Corylopsis seeds from eastern Tennessee;" Caroline Siegert, who gave a presentation entitled "Structure and affinities of a novel type of endocarp from the Gray Fossil Site, Tennessee;" and Liz Hermsen, who gave a presentation entitled "The Digital Encyclopedia of Ancient Life (DEAL): An open-access, online paleontology textbook."

The Public Market, Seattle, Washington The Geological Society of America annual meeting for 2017 was held in Seattle, Washington. I presented a paper on mosquito ferns coauthored with scientists from Cornell University, Nathan Jud and María A. Gandolfo. You can read the abstract here .

The Hermsen lab was well-represented at the 34th Midcontinent Paleobotanical Colloquium , held from May 12 to May 14, 2017, at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan. One poster and one talk were contributed based on research from the lab; the poster included two student co-authors. For more information, see the following links: 34th Midcontinent Paleobotanical Colloquium Abstracts Ohio University College of Arts & Sciences Forum:  "Hermsen presents on understanding fossil record of the water clover family" Ohio University College of Arts & Sciences Forum:  "Welker presents poster on fruits from Tennessee's Gray Fossil Site"

Marsilea,  Liberty Hyde Bailey Conservatory Greenhouse, Cornell University My trips to the 33rd Northeast-Midcontinent Paleobotanical Colloquium and  10th Annual Summer Symposium at the Paleontological Research Institution in Ithaca, New York, were covered in Ohio University's College of Arts & Sciences Forum .

Fossil wood from the Museum of the Earth, Ithaca, New York Over the summer, Dr. María A. Gandolfo and myself published a new paper entitled " Fruits of Juglandaceae from the Eocene of South America " in Systematic Botany . The accompanying data files are housed in the Dryad Digital Repository. This is part of a large ongoing research project on the Paleogene fossil floras of Patagonia.  In August, I attended the 10th Annual Summer Symposium at the Paleontological Research Institution in Ithaca, New York. I gave an updated presentation on the fossil record of water clovers, entitled "Fossil water clovers and wannabees."

The famous Gilboa fossils. The 33rd Northeast-Midcontinent Paleobotanical was held at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, from May 14th to 15th, 2016. Talks were presented on the 14th, including " A Tribute to Tom Taylor " given by Gar Rothwell. This was followed by a slate of interesting research presentations . I presented a sole-authored talk, "Water clovers and their pretenders," related to my current research. On May 15th, the meeting continued with a field trip to the Catskill Mountains. Stops were related to Devonian fossil plant sites of New York. We saw some of the famous Gilboa fossils and visited a site where ancient rooting structures were exposed. Thank you to the organizers of the colloquium and the field trip for a fantastic meeting!