May 17, 2006 11:19 pm US/Mountain
Possible 'Missing Link' In Plant Evolution Found
by Shaun Boyd
BOULDER, Colo. (CBS4) ―
A study at the University of Colorado at Boulder may have found the "missing link" between flowering plants and their ancestors. The research could answer a mystery in plant evolution that has confused scientists since Charles Darwin formed his theory of natural selection nearly 130 years ago.
The research at CU involved a "living fossil plant" that has survived on the planet for 130 million years. The plant's unique reproductive system is the key to its possible role as the missing link.
The Amborella plant was found in the rain forests of New Caledonia in the South Pacific.
Scientists said it may represent a critical link between diverse flowering plants, known as angiosperms, and their yet-to-be-identified extinct ancestors.
"One of the biggest challenges for evolutionary biologists is understanding how these flowering plants arose on Earth," William "Ned" Friedman, a professor in CU-Boulder's ecology and evolutionary biology department.
His study appears in the May 18 issue of Nature.
"The unique four-celled egg apparatus in Amborella could represent a critical link between angiosperms and gymnosperms," he wrote in Nature.
The surprising new finding suggests flowering plants may have arisen on Earth during a time when plant evolution was "particularly flexible," Friedman said.
"The study shows that the structure that houses the egg in Amborella is different from every other flowering plant known and may be the potential missing link between flowering plants and their progenitors," he said.
The study was funded by the National Science Foundation.
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