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Adaptation, plant evolution, and the fossil record.

A H Knoll1, K J Niklas

  • 1Botanical Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.

Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology
|January 1, 1987
PubMed
Summary

Adaptation significantly influences plant evolution, especially following structural innovations. However, environmental disruption, not just adaptation, shaped Carboniferous-Jurassic plant fossil records.

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Area of Science:

  • Evolutionary Biology
  • Paleobotany
  • Paleoecology

Background:

  • Debate exists on adaptation's role in evolutionary patterns.
  • Paleobotany examines if natural selection sufficiently explains fossil plant distributions.
  • Functional evaluation of plant organs in paleoenvironments is key.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To assess if adaptive evolution explains stratigraphic distributions of plant taxa.
  • To investigate the role of functional performance in plant evolution.
  • To compare evolutionary drivers in different geological periods.

Main Methods:

  • Functional evaluation of stratigraphic series of plant organs.
  • Quantitative estimation of biophysical performance from fossil structures.
  • Comparison of performance estimates across time and space.

Main Results:

  • Following innovations, adaptation drives plant evolution, but faces limits.
  • Silurian-Devonian plant succession aligns with adaptation and improved biophysical performance.
  • Carboniferous-Jurassic plant records show significant environmental disruption influence.

Conclusions:

  • Adaptation is a major factor in plant evolution after innovations.
  • Environmental disruption played a larger role in Carboniferous-Jurassic plant evolution than previously thought.
  • Adaptive evolution may have occurred in less-recorded environments during the Carboniferous-Jurassic.
Keywords:
NASA Discipline ExobiologyNon-NASA Center

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