Today , the vast majority of the plants in the world are angiosperms ( flowering plant life ) . They provide our nutrient and those of the fauna we eat , as well as produce the air we breathe and the beauty on which we flourish . Apart from the great coniferous tree forests of the north , non - flowering plants like fern and horsetails have been reduce to ecological niches . Surprisingly , however , the story of flowers is not one of a new innovation fleetly dismiss its inferior herald . rather , there was a long wait between the arrival of the first peak and the subjugation of the major planet , during which various sorts of non - flowering plants maintain authority .
Dr Hervé Sauquetof the Royal Botanic Garden Sydney and the Australian Institute of Botanical Science has print inNature Ecology and Evolutionthe most comprehensive study yet of the angiosperm family tree . His research support what others had suspect , that flowers first appeared at least 140 million years ago , possibly much sooner , and most of the families we know today particular date back at least 100 million years . Yet the stunning abundance that seems normal to us came much later .
“ Fossils are the most authoritative composition of evidence needed to understand these significant evolutionary questions around angiosperm divergence times , ” Sauquet said in astatement . “ Previous studies of this nature only used 30 to 60 fossil phonograph recording and we wanted to increase this number importantly and set a higher measure for fossil calibration by document every part of the process . We often had to translate record from different languages and do relentless detective work to get century - previous as well as the latest fogy descriptions in our paw . ”
Using this data source , Sauquet reason out that individual angiosperm kinsperson took between 37 and 56 million years from their appearance to reach their “ crown ” , the last vernacular ancestor of exist abundance . For something like a third of their sentence on Earth , these families failed to flower into anything close to their potency .
When require the understanding for such a delay , Sauquet told IFLScience that “ the short answer is we do n’t experience . " The capacity of flower to be pollinate by insects , a far more efficient intermediary than the malarkey or other pre - existing method acting , has been a bad part of flowering flora ' success .
“ It ’s potential the first pollinators were not doing such a big occupation ” Sauquet order , and it exact a long time for them to evolve shapes suited to optimum pollen transfer of training . However , he admits this is “ just an estimation . ”
The date at which most angiosperm kinfolk diversified are imperfectly established , but many may cooccur with the K - atomic number 15 edge , when non - avian dinosaur went extinct . sure most of the kinsfolk we be intimate precede this calamity , and were much more likely to make it through than fauna , particularly vertebrates , even if individual metal money died out .
“ It ’s not clear if the asteroid had a great effect , ” Sauquet tell IFLScience , but it is possible the huge employee turnover of life on Earth give these plants an opportunity they take over , while older lineages declined or locomote extinct entirely .
