Abstract Detail

Paleobotany

Scharfstein, Alex [1], Stockey, Ruth [2], Rothwell, Gar [3].

Liquidambar-like infructescences from the Upper Cretaceous (Coniacian) Eden Main Quarry, Vancouver Island, British Columbia.

Five specimens of Liquidambar-like infructescences and dispersed fruits have been identified from the Late Cretaceous (Coniacian) Eden Main Quarry from Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. Two infructescences and three isolated two-loculed fruits are preserved in calcium carbonate marine concretions and studied using the cellulose acetate peel technique. Infructescences are globose ca 1 cm in diameter, with at least 20 two-loculed fruits. We have been unable to identify any extra-floral processes, or perianth parts. The infructescences are abraded and style tips not visible. Each fruit has two carpels that are fused basally. The inner carpel wall is a single palisade layer of elongate rectangular cells, and several layers of thick walled elongate sclerenchyma cells. The outer fruit wall is well-differentiated with fiber bundles interspersed with parenchyma and possible resin canals. There are more than 10 seeds/carpel with axile placentation, but most of these are immature or aborted. A few seeds near the base of the fruit have developed further and show an outer uniseriate palisade cell layer and an inner zone of isodiametric cells. Fruits have septicidal and ventricidal dehiscence. This suite of characters compares favorably to both extant and fossil species of Altingiaceae. In contrast to the results of recent analyses that resolve the species of Altingia and Liquidambar as a single clade, our parsimony analysis using morphological characters of living and extinct species resolves an Altingia clade as the sister group to a Liquidambar clade. The Eden Main fruits attach to the tree at the basal node of the Altingia clade, and therefore, are more closely related to extant Altingia than to the nearly co-eval Microaltingia from the Lower Magothy Formation.

1 - Oregon State University, Botany and Plant Pathology, 2082 Cordley Hall, Corvallis, 97331, USA
2 - Oregon State University, Department Of Botany And Plant Pathology, 2082 Cordley Hall, Corvallis, OR, 97331.0, United States
3 - Oregon State University, Department Of Botany And Plant Pathology, 2082 Cordley Hall, Corvallis, OR, 97331, United States

Keywords:
Liquidambar
Cretaceous
permineralized
infructescence
Altingiaceae.

Presentation Type: Oral Paper
Session: CK2, Cookson Award Session II
Location: Tucson G/Starr Pass
Date: Monday, July 29th, 2019
Time: 11:15 AM
Number: CK2005
Abstract ID:120
Candidate for Awards:Isabel Cookson Award,Maynard F. Moseley Award