Preserved flowers in amber from the Miocene of Simojovel de Allende, Chiapas, Mexico
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Abstract
Simojovel de Allende, Chiapas, Mexico, is one of the amber deposits in the world with exceptionally preserved biological evidence of plants and animals. Within the paleobotanical record of the area members of Anacardiaceae, Leguminosae, Meliaceae and Arecaceae have been reported based on flowers, which are a special case because of its delicate and ephemeral structures, difficult to preserve in the fossil record. In this paper we describe the morphology of two flowers preserved in amber from Chiapas, attributing possible taxonomic affinities. The first one corresponds to a small bisexual, hipogineous, pedicellated, pentameric flower, with differentiated perianth. These characters allow its comparisonm with members of the families Ericaceae, Malvaceae, Rutaceae and Sapindaceae, however, it has higher morphological similarity with Sapindaceae due to the presence of 5 pubescent filament. A second inconspicuous, unisexual ower, with differentiated perianth, 2 ovate sepals and 3 clawed petals is compared with Commelinaceae, Alismataceae, Menispermaceae, and Polygonaceae: The latter ones having greater resemblance to the fossil flower based on the presence of five pubescent stamens. The possible presence of Sapindaceae and Polygonaceae in the past of southern Mexico, supports the idea of the presence of a tropical forest in the Simojovel de Allende at that time, however, the fossil flowers are in need of further comparison with those of extat plants to confirm their taxonomic identification, allowing a better understand of the paleoenvironment as well as of the floristic elements composing the vegetation for 20 m. a.
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