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Archaefructus
 
 
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Archaefructus is an extinct
Extinction

In biology and ecology, extinction is the death of every member of a species or group of taxon. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of that species ....
 genus of herbaceous
Herbaceous

A herbaceous plant is a plant that has leaf and stem that die down at the end of the growing season to the soil level. A herbaceous plant may be Annual plant, Biennial plant or Perennial plant....
 aquatic seed plants with 3 known species. Fossil
Fossil

Fossils are the preserved remains or trace fossil of animals, plants, and other organisms from the remote past. The totality of fossils, both discovered and undiscovered, and their placement in fossiliferous Rock formations and sedimentary rock layers is known as the fossil record....
 material assigned to this genus originates from the Yixian Formation
Yixian Formation

The Yixian Formation is a geological formation in Jinzhou, Liaoning, People's Republic of China, that stems from the early Cretaceous period. It is known for its fossils....
 in northeastern China
China

China is a Culture of China, an ancient civilization, and, depending on perspective, a national or multinational entity extending over a large area in East Asia....
, originally dated as late Jurassic
Jurassic

The Jurassic is a geologic period that extends from about annum to  Ma, that is, from the end of the Triassic to the beginning of the Cretaceous....
 but now thought to be approximately 125 million years old, or early Cretaceous
Cretaceous

The Cretaceous , usually abbreviated K for its German translation Kreide, is a geologic period from circa to million years ago . In the geologic timescale, the Cretaceous follows on the Jurassic period and is followed by the Paleogene period....
 in age. Even with its revised age, Archaefructus has been proposed to be one of the earliest known genera
Genus

A genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the classification of living and fossil organisms. The taxonomic ranks are domain , kingdom , phylum, class , order , family , genus, and species....
 of flowering plant
Flowering plant

The flowering plants or angiosperms are the most widespread group of Embryophytes. The flowering plants and the gymnosperms are the only extant groups of Spermatophyte....
s.

Because of its age, and because it lacks sepals and petals and its reproductive organs, interpreted as carpels and stamens, are produced on an elongate stem rather than condensed into a flower as in modern angiosperms, Archaefructaceae has been proposed as a new basal angiosperm
Flowering plant

The flowering plants or angiosperms are the most widespread group of Embryophytes. The flowering plants and the gymnosperms are the only extant groups of Spermatophyte....
 family.






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Encyclopedia


Archaefructus is an extinct
Extinction

In biology and ecology, extinction is the death of every member of a species or group of taxon. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of that species ....
 genus of herbaceous
Herbaceous

A herbaceous plant is a plant that has leaf and stem that die down at the end of the growing season to the soil level. A herbaceous plant may be Annual plant, Biennial plant or Perennial plant....
 aquatic seed plants with 3 known species. Fossil
Fossil

Fossils are the preserved remains or trace fossil of animals, plants, and other organisms from the remote past. The totality of fossils, both discovered and undiscovered, and their placement in fossiliferous Rock formations and sedimentary rock layers is known as the fossil record....
 material assigned to this genus originates from the Yixian Formation
Yixian Formation

The Yixian Formation is a geological formation in Jinzhou, Liaoning, People's Republic of China, that stems from the early Cretaceous period. It is known for its fossils....
 in northeastern China
China

China is a Culture of China, an ancient civilization, and, depending on perspective, a national or multinational entity extending over a large area in East Asia....
, originally dated as late Jurassic
Jurassic

The Jurassic is a geologic period that extends from about annum to  Ma, that is, from the end of the Triassic to the beginning of the Cretaceous....
 but now thought to be approximately 125 million years old, or early Cretaceous
Cretaceous

The Cretaceous , usually abbreviated K for its German translation Kreide, is a geologic period from circa to million years ago . In the geologic timescale, the Cretaceous follows on the Jurassic period and is followed by the Paleogene period....
 in age. Even with its revised age, Archaefructus has been proposed to be one of the earliest known genera
Genus

A genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the classification of living and fossil organisms. The taxonomic ranks are domain , kingdom , phylum, class , order , family , genus, and species....
 of flowering plant
Flowering plant

The flowering plants or angiosperms are the most widespread group of Embryophytes. The flowering plants and the gymnosperms are the only extant groups of Spermatophyte....
s.

Because of its age, and because it lacks sepals and petals and its reproductive organs, interpreted as carpels and stamens, are produced on an elongate stem rather than condensed into a flower as in modern angiosperms, Archaefructaceae has been proposed as a new basal angiosperm
Flowering plant

The flowering plants or angiosperms are the most widespread group of Embryophytes. The flowering plants and the gymnosperms are the only extant groups of Spermatophyte....
 family. An alternate interpretation of the same fossil, however, interprets the elongate stem as an inflorescence rather than a flower, with staminate (male) flowers below and pistillate (female) flower above. The discovery of Archaefructus eoflora supports this interpretation, because a bisexual flower is present in the region between staminate and pistillate organs. If this interpretation is correct, Archaefructus may not be basal within angiosperms, rather it may be close to the Nymphaeales
Nymphaeales

Nymphaeales is a botanical name at the rank of order . When recognized, it includes Nymphaeaceae and sometimes other aquatic plants. This order is not part of the APG II system 2003 plant classification , which instead has a broadly circumscribed family Nymphaeaceae unplaced in any order....
 or the basal eudicots
Eudicots

Eudicots and Eudicotyledons are terms introduced by Doyle & Hotton to refer to a group of flowering plants that had been called "tricolpates" or "non-Magnoliid dicots" by previous authors....
.

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