CRANE, PETER R. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Richmond, Surrey, TW9 3AB, U.K. - Paleobotany: back to the future.
Paleobotany traces its origins to the mid-nineteenth century, but at
the beginning of the twenty-first century data from fossil plants have
never been more relevant to understanding large scale patterns of
plant evolution. Part of this renaissance has been fuelled by
advances in paleobotany that have emphasised thorough integration of
paleobotanical data with information from living plants. The
relevance of paleobotanical data has also been greatly facilitated by
renewed interest in plant phylogeny and the application of cladistic
methods to both living and fossil taxa. Placed in a phylogenetic
context paleobotanical data significantly expand our sample of plant
diversity in time and space, and also provide a basis for beginning to
understand the origins of modern plant diversity by calibrating rates
of diversification. An integrated phylogenetic and paleobotanical
approach to investigating plant diversification is also of great
importance for understanding the origin of modern biogeographic
patterns, and this is likely to be a major focus of research on plant
diversity in coming decades.
Key words: biogeography, diversity, paleobotany, phylogeny