Dinosaur-Era Plant Found Alive in North America for First Time

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http://drexel.edu/now/archive/2017/July/Dinosaur-Era-Plant-Found-Alive-in-North-America-for-First-Time/

Dinosaur-Era Plant Found Alive in North America for First Time

By: Frank Otto
July 31, 2017

Imagine you’re at work and suddenly, a cheetah pokes its head through your window.

That’s about what Richard McCourt, PhD, and his colleagues dealt with when they came across Lychnothamnus barbatus, a large green alga that was thought to have died in the Western Hemisphere long before the cheetahs here died out.

“This means mainly that we don’t know as much about what’s out there as we could,” said McCourt, associate curator of Botany at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University and professor in the University’s College of Arts and Sciences. “Lychnothamnus barbatus’ survival isn’t, per se, ecologically earth-shaking, but it changes our view of what the algal flora of North America is composed of and inspires us to keep hunting for more new finds.”

A paper on the find, featuring mapping and analysis by the Academy’s John D. Hall, PhD, and lead-authored by Kenneth Karol, PhD, of the New York Botanical Garden, was published in the American Journal of Botany’s July issue.

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http://dx.doi.org/10.3732/ajb.1700172