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Meet your new favourite plant

Most of us are captivated by the thought of a “living fossil”, which is any organism that appeared millions of years ago in the fossil record and survives today, relatively unchanged. The maidenhair tree, Ginkgo biloba, ticks all the boxes of this definition. The genus Ginkgo is well known in China and Japan where it has special significance in Buddhism and Confucianism, and first became known to European botanists in the <a rel="noopener" href="https://e360.yale.edu/features/peter_crane_history_of_ginkgo_earths_oldest_tree" target="_blank">late 1600s</a>. Today, ancient ginkgo fossils can be found all over the world, some of which are almost 300 million years old – a time when dinosaurs roamed the planet. Let’s delve further into what makes this species so remarkable: from its ability to survive nuclear bombs, to its vomit-smelling seeds, to it’s beautiful autumn display. Hardy survivors The ancestral ginkgo evolved so long ago it spread across the super continent Pangaea and was present in both the northern component (Laurasia) and the southern part (Gondwana, which included Australia) when the continents fragmented. <a rel="noopener" href="http://www.fossilmuseum.net/plantfossils/Ginkgoites/Ginkgoites.htm" target="_blank">As a result</a> there are fossils, Ginkgo australis, from the cretaceous period about 65-140 million years ago in the Koonwarra Fish Fossil beds near Leongatha, Victoria. There are also much more recent (about 20 million years old) fossils from Tasmania. Ginkgo biloba has an intriguing appearance. It can grow up to 35 metres tall with a spreading canopy, and its leaves are a wonderful fan shape, often with a little cleft or notch. <a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440760/original/file-20220113-1519-1mak6c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440760/original/file-20220113-1519-1mak6c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="" /></a> The wonderful fan shape of their leaves. Photoholgic/Unsplash, <a rel="noopener" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/" target="_blank" class="license">CC BY</a> As you might imagine for a genus dating back almost 300 million years, the maidenhair tree is both hardy and resilient, tolerating a wide range of soil and climatic conditions. The tree is known to be very long-lived and some specimens at temple sites are thought to be over 1,000 years old which, in part, explains <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.abc.net.au/gardening/factsheets/maidenhair-tree/9436966" target="_blank">the mystique</a> associated with the species. They have a lignotuber – a modified stem at the base of the trunk containing lots of buds – which allows for sprouting at ground level and multiple stems. The lignotuber allows for rapid recovery from serious environmental stresses such as fire and defoliation. In fact, six trees <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.academia.edu/1135523/Ginkgo_in_Australia" target="_blank">not only survived</a> the bombing of Hiroshima, but recovered quickly, are healthy and <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2019/10/29/20932379/ginkgo-tree-atomic-bomb-hiroshima-bombing" target="_blank">growing still</a>. Their survival showed the resilience of the ginkgo and the trees became an <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-manchester-29920359" target="_blank">important symbol</a> that recovery from disaster was, indeed, possible. Australians can empathise with this as the vibrant re-sprouting of trees after bushfires often plays a similar symbolic role. Stinky seeds and dinosaur food Things continue to get interesting when you consider there are separate male and female trees; a relatively rare feature in modern trees. The male reproductive structures have mobile sperm that swim to the ovule for fertilisation, which is considered a primitive or ancient characteristic. If fertilisation occurs, the female tree produces a seed that resembles a fruit. The seed’s soft fleshy layer is malodorous, with people often describing it as being revolting or smelling of human vomit. <a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440761/original/file-20220113-21-1qb28wj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440761/original/file-20220113-21-1qb28wj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="" /></a> The seeds, resembling fruits, are known for its repulsive smell. Shutterstock A pair of female maidenhair trees was planted outside the entrance to the Old Geology building at the University of Melbourne in the 1920s. Since then, staff and students have had to use the side entrance when trees held seeds. This will probably continue for decades to come. Likewise, I know of a couple of female trees that were planted outside the entrance to a major bank branch in Hawthorn, Victoria. It was considered karma by disgruntled customers, until their sudden removal by a desperate manager. The male tree doesn’t smell but produces pollen, which has been known to cause allergies, so be wary of which sex you plant <a rel="noopener" href="https://bie.ala.org.au/species/NZOR-6-74385" target="_blank">and where</a> you plant them. The seed’s strong scent has been linked to its dispersal, as many animals are drawn to strong, even rancid smelling fruits. There’s little evidence as to which animals or birds eat ginkgo seeds today, but there has been speculation the seeds may have been eaten by dinosaurs. Ginkgos <a rel="noopener" href="http://blogs.nature.com/soapboxscience/2011/11/02/the-living-dinosaur" target="_blank">coexisted with dinosaurs</a> for millions of years. It’s easy to imagine a huge herbivorous dinosaur munching on tall maidenhair trees. Sadly, there’s no evidence of gingko seeds in fossilised dinosaur droppings. But for those who are captivated by the connection of a living fossil and dinosaurs, perhaps that fossil is still to be found. <a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440754/original/file-20220113-15-6llrxg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440754/original/file-20220113-15-6llrxg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="" /></a> Ginkgo biloba in Huishan Temple of Huishan Ancient Town, China. Jerry Wang/Unsplash, <a rel="noopener" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/" target="_blank" class="license">CC BY</a> Ginkgo for gardeners Ginkgo biloba has been cultivated for more than 3,000 years, and so whether it grows naturally in the wild is uncertain. Even in China, it grows most often in homes and temples, and there’s very little genetic diversity within the plants suggesting they’ve been grown from cuttings. The tree has been so widely planted it now occurs in major cities and botanic gardens around the world. <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.academia.edu/1135523/Ginkgo_in_Australia" target="_blank">In Australia</a>, many of us live within a few kilometres of a recent planting. Many of the ginkgo trees planted in urban landscapes are males grown from cuttings. But there are different cultivars available from nurseries, with some being all female varieties that are highly prized for their brilliant yellow autumnal colour. <a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440751/original/file-20220113-1697-q978np.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440751/original/file-20220113-1697-q978np.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="Bright yellow Ginkgo tree" /></a> Female trees have a stunning autumn display. Shutterstock Apart from allergenic pollen and vile smelling seeds, Ginkgo biloba can have another very annoying or perhaps frustrating habit for gardeners. Young plants can grow very tall before their side branches begin to grow and develop. This form of growth, called bolting, is considered an adaptation to stressed environments, but it’s little consolation when you’ve been growing a gingko for 20 years, it’s over 6m tall and still looks like a bean pole. You have to be patient with slow-growing, long-lived trees, but they’re worth the wait! They rarely, if ever, have pest or disease problems, they are hardy and, despite being cultivated in Europe and North America for centuries, have never become weedy. They may well be described as living fossils, but they are in fact a resilient genus of modern plants that can cope with whatever the environment has thrown at them for over 300 million years. They are the epitome of great survivors and I would not be betting against their chances of surviving for millennia to come.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important; text-shadow: none !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/164630/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /> <a rel="noopener" href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/gregory-moore-1779" target="_blank">Gregory Moore</a>, Doctor of Botany, <a rel="noopener" href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722" target="_blank">The University of Melbourne</a> This article is republished from <a rel="noopener" href="https://theconversation.com" target="_blank">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a rel="noopener" href="https://theconversation.com/dinosaur-food-and-hiroshima-bomb-survivors-maidenhair-trees-are-living-fossils-and-your-new-favourite-plant-164630" target="_blank">original article</a>. Image: Getty Images

Home & Garden

66 million-year-old perfectly preserved dinosaur embryo found

Images: Courtesy Shoulin Animation & Getty Scientists are showing off a perfectly preserved dinosaur embryo fossil that was preparing to hatch from its egg, much like a modern-day chicken. The embryo fossil, nicknamed “Baby Yingliang,” was discovered in Ganzhou, Jiangxi Province in southern China, and is believed to be at least 66 million years old. Researcher Dr. Fion Waisum Ma told the AFP News Agency that this discovery is “the best dinosaur embryo ever found in history.” According to a study, researchers at a Chinese mining company, Yinagliang Group, found the egg fossil more than 20 years ago, but put it in storage with other fossils for 10 years. <img style="width: 500px; height: 281.25px;" src="https://oversixtydev.blob.core.windows.net/media/7846550/new-project.jpg" alt="" data-udi="umb://media/8b66ef36cdec4b21b7bfdff89ef98730" /> When construction began on the company’s natural history museum, the fossil storage was sorted, and museum staff pulled the dinosaur eggs from the collection for closer examination. That’s when they noticed some bones on the broken cross section of one of the eggs. Researchers say the egg belonged to a toothless theropod dinosaur, or oviraptorosaur. Ma and fellow colleagues found Baby Yingliang’s head below its body, with its feet on either side and back curled. This posture is familiar in modern birds but not previously seen in dinosaurs. Researchers believe the animal was on the verge of hatching, but it was likely preserved when it was buried by a sudden mudslide. Oviraptorosaurs, one of the closest relatives to the bird, evolved earlier from small, feathered dinosaurs. This group of dinosaurs was still blossoming and diversifying during the last few million years before an asteroid struck Earth about 66 million years ago, wiping out the dinosaurs. The baby dino measures about 27 centimetres long and is currently on display at the Yinglliang Stone Natural History Museum. Most likely a herbivore, it would have grown to be about three metres long if it lived to adulthood. “We were surprised to see this embryo beautifully preserved inside a dinosaur egg, lying in a bird-like posture. This posture had not been recognized in non-avian dinosaurs before,” Waisum Maof of the University of Birmingham, told CBS News. Despite fossilised dinosaur eggs having been found during the last 100 years, a well-preserved embryo is extremely rare, the researchers said in their study. Paleontologists have found them over the years only six times.

International Travel

False fossils could hamper search for life on Mars

<div> <div class="copy"> If you’re an interplanetary alien hunter scouring the red expanses of Mars for signs of life, you’re more likely to come across <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://cosmosmagazine.com/space/looking-for-microbes-on-mars/" target="_blank">microbes</a> than little green men. You’re even more likely to come across fossils of ancient critters that lived billions of years ago. But new research warns that chemical processes can create “pseudofossils”, potentially fooling future exo-palaeontologists. “At some stage a Mars rover will almost certainly find something that looks a lot like a fossil, so being able to confidently distinguish these from structures and substances made by chemical reactions is vital,” says astrobiologist Sean McMahon from the University of Edinburgh, UK. “For every type of fossil out there, there is at least one non-biological process that creates very similar things, so there is a real need to improve our understanding of how these form.” In a study published in the Journal of the Geological Society, McMahon and colleagues from the Universities of Edinburgh and Oxford assessed dozens of known processes that could have created life-like traces in Martian rocks. Many chemical processes can mimic the structures created by microscopic lifeforms, like bacterial cells or carbon-based molecules that make up the building blocks of life as we know it. Stromatolites are one example of fossils that could be impersonated. These rock-like structures formed from layers deposited by communities of blue-green algae. Called “living fossils”, they are still <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://cosmosmagazine.com/history/palaeontology/extremely-ancient-lifeform-discovered-in-tasmania/" target="_blank">found</a> in shallow aquatic environments today, and at more than 3.5 billion years old they’re among the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://cosmosmagazine.com/earth/earth-sciences/earliest-life-found-in-ancient-aussie-rocks/" target="_blank">oldest evidence</a> for life on Earth. But non-biological processes can produce pseudofossils that mimic the domes and columns of stromatolites. Surprisingly, similar deposits can build up in places like factory floors, where cars are spray-painted, as well as more natural processes like the deposition of silica around hot springs, some of which <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms13554" target="_blank">have recently been found</a> on Mars. Another example of ambiguous fossils can be found in sandstone beds from the Ediacaran period, 550 million years ago. Animal and plant-like imprints are embedded in “textured” rocks, where the texture actually represents fossilised microbial mats that once covered the ancient sea floor. A joint Australian-US team has <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://cosmosmagazine.com/earth/earth-sciences/studying-fossils-with-ai-tech/" target="_blank">recently been awarded</a> NASA funding to see if AI can distinguish between rocks that are formed from biological signatures (like these microbial mats) or from purely abiotic chemical processes. The team’s ultimate goal is to apply similar machine learning techniques to geological images taken by Mars rovers. This new paper by UK astrobiologists says that research like this may be key to the success of current and future exobiology missions. “We have been fooled by life-mimicking processes in the past,” says co-author Julie Cosmidis, a geobiologist from the University of Oxford. “On many occasions, objects that looked like fossil microbes were described in ancient rocks on Earth and even in meteorites from Mars, but after deeper examination they turned out to have non-biological origins. “This article is a cautionary tale in which we call for further research on life-mimicking processes in the context of Mars, so that we avoid falling into the same traps over and over again.”  <img id="cosmos-post-tracker" style="opacity: 0; height: 1px!important; width: 1px!important; border: 0!important; position: absolute!important; z-index: -1!important;" src="https://syndication.cosmosmagazine.com/?id=172969&title=False+fossils+could+hamper+search+for+life+on+Mars" alt="" width="1" height="1" /> </div> <div id="contributors"> <a href="https://cosmosmagazine.com/space/astrobiology/false-fossils-on-mars-could-hamper-search-for-life/">This article</a> was originally published on <a href="https://cosmosmagazine.com">Cosmos Magazine</a> and was written by <a href="https://cosmosmagazine.com/contributor/lauren-fuge">Lauren Fuge</a>. Lauren Fuge is a science journalist at Cosmos. She holds a BSc in physics from the University of Adelaide and a BA in English and creative writing from Flinders University. Image: gremlin/Getty Images </div> </div>

International Travel

Stone tools reveal epic trek of nomadic Neanderthals

Neanderthal (Homo neanderthalensis) fossils were first discovered in western Europe in the mid nineteenth century. That was just the first in a long line of surprises thrown up by our closest evolutionary cousins. We reveal another in <a href="https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2020/01/21/1918047117">our new study</a> of the Neanderthals who lived in Chagyrskaya Cave in southern Siberia around 54,000 years ago. Their distinctive stone tools are dead ringers for those found thousands of kilometres away in eastern and central Europe. The intercontinental journey made by these intrepid Neanderthals is equivalent to walking from Sydney to Perth, or from New York to Los Angeles, and is a rare example of long-distance migration by Palaeolithic people. Knuckleheads no more For a long time Neanderthals were seen as intellectual lightweights. However, <a href="https://theconversation.com/neanderthals-were-no-brutes-research-reveals-they-may-have-been-precision-workers-103858">several recent finds</a> have forced a rethink of their cognitive and creative abilities. Neanderthals are now believed to have created 176,000 year-old enigmatic structures made from broken stalactites in a <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2016/05/neanderthals-caves-rings-building-france-archaeology/">cave in France</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-we-discovered-that-neanderthals-could-make-art-92127">cave art in Spain</a>that dates back more than 65,000 years. They also used <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0045927">bird feathers</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aar5255">pierced shells</a> bearing traces of red and yellow ochre, possibly as personal ornaments. It seems likely Neanderthals had cognitive capabilities and symbolic behaviours similar to those of modern humans (Homo sapiens). Our knowledge of their geographical range and the nature of their encounters with other groups of humans has also expanded greatly in recent years. We now know that Neanderthals ventured beyond Europe and western Asia, reaching at least as far east as the Altai Mountains. Here, they interbred with another group of archaic humans dubbed the <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/scientists-recreate-face-denisovan-using-dna-180973177/">Denisovans</a>. Traces of Neanderthal interactions with our own ancestors also persist in the DNA of all living people of Eurasian descent. However, we can still only speculate why the Neanderthals vanished around 40,000 years ago. Banished to Siberia Other questions also remain unresolved. When did Neanderthals first arrive in the Altai? Were there later migration events? Where did these trailblazers begin their trek? And what routes did they take across Asia? <a href="https://www.antiquity.ac.uk/projgall/derevyanko345">Chagyrskaya Cave</a> is nestled in the foothills of the Altai Mountains. The cave deposits were first excavated in 2007 and have yielded almost 90,000 stone tools and numerous bone tools. The excavations have also found 74 Neanderthal fossils – the richest trove of any Altai site – and a range of animal and plant remains, including the abundant bones of bison hunted and butchered by the Neanderthals. We used <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/520438a">optical dating</a> to determine when the cave sediments, artefacts and fossils were deposited, and conducted a detailed study of more than 3,000 stone tools recovered from the deepest archaeological levels. Microscopy analysis revealed that these have remained intact and undisturbed since accumulating during a period of cold and dry climate about 54,000 years ago. Using a variety of statistical techniques, we show that these artefacts bear a striking similarity to so-called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micoquien">Micoquian</a> artefacts from central and eastern Europe. This type of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_Paleolithic">Middle Palaeolithic</a> assemblage is readily identified by the distinctive appearance of the bifaces – tools made by removing flakes from both sides – which were used to cut meat. Micoquian-like tools have only been found at one other site in the Altai. All other archaeological assemblages in the Altai and central Asia lack these distinctive artefacts. Neanderthals carrying Micoquian tools may never have reached <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-00353-0">Denisova Cave</a>, as there is no fossil or sedimentary DNA evidence of Neanderthals there after 100,000 years ago. Going the distance The presence of Micoquian artefacts at Chagyrskaya Cave suggests at least two separate dispersals of Neanderthals into southern Siberia. Sites such as Denisova Cave were occupied by Neanderthals who entered the region before 100,000 years ago, while the Chagyrskaya Neanderthals arrived later. The Chagyrskaya artefacts most closely resemble those found at sites located 3,000–4,000 km to the west, between the Crimea and northern Caucasus in eastern Europe. Comparison of genetic data supports these geographical links, with the <a href="https://www.eva.mpg.de/genetics/genome-projects/chagyrskaya-neandertal/home.html">Chagyrskaya Neanderthal</a> sharing closer affinities with several European Neanderthals than with a Neanderthal from Denisova Cave. When the Chagyrskaya toolmakers (or their ancestors) left their Neanderthal homeland in eastern Europe for central Asia around 60,000 years ago, they could have headed north and east around the land-locked <a href="https://www.britannica.com/place/Caspian-Sea">Caspian Sea</a>, which was much reduced in size under the prevailing cold and arid conditions. Their intercontinental odyssey over thousands of kilometres is a rarely observed case of long-distance dispersal in the Palaeolithic, and highlights the value of stone tools as culturally informative markers of ancient population movements. Environmental reconstructions from the animal and plant remains at Chagyrskaya Cave suggest that the Neanderthal inhabitants survived in the cold, dry and treeless environment by hunting bison and horses on the steppe or tundra-steppe landscape. Our discoveries reinforce the emerging view of Neanderthals as creative and intelligent people who were skilled survivors. If this was the case, it makes their extinction across Eurasia even more mysterious. Did modern humans deal the fatal blow? The enigma endures, for now. Written by Kseniya Kolobova, Maciej T. Krajcarz and Richard 'Bert' Roberts. Republished with permission of <a href="https://theconversation.com/stone-tools-reveal-epic-trek-of-nomadic-neanderthals-129886">The Conversation.</a>

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Meet your new favourite plant

66 million-year-old perfectly preserved dinosaur embryo found

False fossils could hamper search for life on Mars

Stone tools reveal epic trek of nomadic Neanderthals