They are very tiny, but they are a key source of information when it comes to Earth's evolutionary history: pollen grains are usually no larger than 20 micrometers, or 0.02 millimeters. Using these ...

Angiosperms, also known as flowering plants, represent the most diverse group of seed plants, and their origin and evolution ...

Scientists still strain to make sense of angiosperms' widespread success, which Darwin called an “abominable mystery.” In the last years of his life, Charles Darwin was tormented by an apparent ...

For many years, Charles Darwin was haunted by flowers. In 1859, the naturalist published his most famous work, On the Origin of Species, the book that is generally regarded as the foundation of ...

Fossils of angiosperms first appear in the fossil record about 140 million years ago. Based on the material in which these fossils are deposited, early angiosperms must have been weedy, fast-growing ...

Newly discovered plant fossils from China, dating back more than 125 million years, may help to establish which seed plants evolved into modern flowering plants. Flowering plants, known as angiosperms ...

Botanists have mapped the evolutionary relationships between flowering plants using genomic data from more than 9500 species. The newly compiled tree of life will help scientists piece together the ...

A tiny flower pressed between layers of sandstone for more than 160 million years could be the oldest flower fossil ever found, a new study reports. However, not everyone agrees that the fossil ...

In the summer of 1973 sunflowers appeared in my father's vegetable garden. They seemed to sprout overnight in a few rows he had lent that year to new neighbors from California. Only six years old at ...