Interbeds of the Deccan traps, ~66 million years old, have long been known to contain cherts with anatomically preserved flowers, fruits and seeds. We studied numerous specimens of Sahnianthus, the iconic flower of Deccan Intertrappean cherts, by micro-CT scanning, as well as traditional cellulose acetate peels and scanning electron microscopy of the in-situ pollen, to reconstruct the original floral and pollen morphology. The flowers were collected, in association with fruits of Enigmocarpon, from the type locality of Mohgaon Kalan in Chhindwara, Pradesh and other locations in Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra, Central India. Using micro- CT scans to vary the orientation of virtual sections of complete flowers embedded in chert, we show that nine additional, previously described fossil flower genera represent the same plant and are thus synonyms of Sahnianthus. In addition, we suggest that much of the variation observed in the specimens is due to preservation at different developmental stages from bud to maturity. We observed that the epiphyllous stamens are borne in two whorls contrary to prior treatments assuming a single whorl. The number of stamens in each whorl ranges from seven to nine and is equivalent to the number of perianth lobes and ovary locules of the same flower. The pollen is spheroidal and psilate with inconspicuous narrow colpi and a prominent rib-like equatorial thickening of the exine; these features facilitate recognizing the identity of flowers previously assigned to other genera. The combined characters of Sahnianthus, together with fruit and seed characters of Enigmocarpon, are consistent with placement within, or close to, Lythraceae, as previously suggested.

One of the largest and best known, but never completely investigated, fossil carpological floras of the Zittau Basin is revised. The list of revised taxa is supplemented with materials left by H. Czeczott and her team, and newly collected specimens. New combinations are proposed for four species. On the basis of taxa obtained and their location in the geological profile, Turów floras are assigned to two biostratigraphic stages of the Lower Miocene. The Integrated Plant Record vegetation analysis indicates domination of zonal broad-leaved evergreen forest in most studied fossil assemblages from Turów open pit mine (SW Poland). The palaeoclimate reconstruction using the Coexistence Approach method reveals MAT 17–22°C and MAP 1200–1600 mm for most floristic levels. The obtained palaeovegetation and palaeoclimate parameters correspond with those of other coeval floras of the Zittau Basin and Lusatia.

Brummer Spring is one of several late Eocene wood localities near the town of Post, Oregon, western USA. This locality includes four conifer wood types (one Pinus and three probable Cupressaceae) and 16 angiosperm woods, 13 of which can be assigned to family and three that cannot be reliably placed in an order. Angiosperm families recognized include Lauraceae, Platanaceae, Cercidiphyllaceae, and Fagaceae (common at Eocene localities in North America), as well as Salicaceae (common in compression floras, but rare in wood assemblages), Rosaceae, which has the most specimens at this locality, Meliaceae, and Malvaceae. The affinities of these woods are primarily with warm temperate to subtropical vegetation of eastern Asia and eastern North America. Only Platanoxylon and Fagus occur at the two other Post localities. There also are fruits at Brummer Spring with the only overlap between the fruits and woods being one poorly preserved “Prunus-like” endocarp. Other fruits and seeds are Juglans, Nyssa, possible Magnolia and Taxaceae, and an Incertae Sedis. As was true for the other two Post wood localities, the higher incidence of ring-porosity here as compared to the older middle Eocene Clarno Nut Beds wood assemblage attests to increased seasonality from middle to late Eocene in western North America.

Mock standards, with known concentrations and varied characteristics, when analyzed alongside unknown samples, can provide evaluation, optimization, and validation of scientific methods. Due to the scarcity of commercially available pollen grains, this study introduces a practical and cost-effective method for isolating pollen grains from various sources to be used in a mock pollen standard. Our method was tested using 25 diverse species derived from different sources, including herbarium materials (n, 20; dated from 1941 to 2006), commercially sourced (n, 2), and fresh hand-collected (n, 3), representing a wide range of taxonomic diversity and pollen morphology. Isolation with vacuum filtration, which can be completed in a basic laboratory, easily removes inorganic and organic debris while avoiding lysis of the pollen grains. This paper details the key steps in this method, including a) collecting suitable plant materials containing pollen grains from fresh and herbarium specimens and b) isolating, quantifying and storing the pollen grains. This approach is particularly beneficial for researchers in palynology, plant biology, forensic science and environmental monitoring, offering a practical way to isolate pollen grains for inclusion as a mock standard while preserving both morphological features and genetic material.

New palaeoecological records from two glacial lakes (the Mały Staw – 1183 m a.s.l. and the Wielki Staw – 1225 m a.s.l.) from the Polish Western Sudetes were obtained with the aim of better understanding the long-term vegetation development, the relationship between postglacial migration patterns, climate changes and human interference in mountainous areas, as well as to verify the local survival of some cold-adapted species during the Holocene maximum warming. Vegetation changes were reconstructed using pollen, spores and macrofossils. Several major stages of plant cover evolution over the last 12 000 years were identified. The end of the Late Vistulian (~12 100–11 700 cal BP) was documented for the first time in lake sediments from the region. During this period, the local vegetation was characterized by cold alpine meadows and patches of communities with shrubs (Betula nana, Alnus viridis, Salix, Juniperus, Ephedra) and trees growing at some distance from the lakes. In the Early Holocene, the expansion of boreal forests, consisting of Betula, Pinus sylvestris, as well as continental Larix and Pinus cembra, reached an altitude of ~1180 m a.s.l. An important discovery was the presence of Larix macrofossils in both studied profiles, which together with pollen evidence, confirmed its local persistence from the Early Holocene to the Middle Ages. It was also demonstrtaed that Betula nana, Selaginella selaginoides, Huperzia selago most probably persisted in the area from the Younger Dryas to at least the Middle Ages or even to the modern times, surviving through the Holocene climatic optimum. The increase in grassland representatives from ~4100 cal BP and the appearance of the cultivated plants (Triticum type pollen) from ~3300 cal BP, was due to the long-distance transport of pollen reflecting the development of agriculture and settlement outside the Karkonosze Mountains. It was not until the 10th century AD that the environment underwent a stronger anthropogenic transformation. Growing economic activities (e.g. metallurgy, mining of non-ferrous metal ores, glass production, forest industry) that developed, especially from the 12th century onwards required the supply of wood raw material. The development of agriculture in the region promoted the expansion of meadows and pastures and the greatest taxonomic diversity of herbaceous plants was recorded between the 13th and 15th centuries.

As a result of the research, we determined the sectional affiliation of fossil remains of the genus Crataegus from the Early Pleistocene of the south-eastern part of Armenia, in the middle reaches of the Vorotan River. Plant fossils and imprints help to establish the distribution of species over the Earth’s surface during different geological periods. Of particular interest are the findings of species of the genus Crataegus, which is considered to be systematically very complex due to its inherent hybridization, apomixis, and polyploidy. In the modern flora of Armenia, the genus Crataegus is represented by three sections with 23 species. Comparative macromorphological analysis of fossil and modern hawthorns showed that the studied fossil remains belong to the section Crataegus. Among the species found in the territory, in terms of macromorphological characteristics, they are close to Crataegus rhipidophylla, C. caucasica and C. monogyna.

The aim of the archaeobotanical research of plant macro remains assemblage from the Early Neolithic settlement at Modlniczka in southern Poland is to study plants (fruit and seeds), cultivated and wild species used by the oldest farming groups during the early phase of occupation at the sites. The results were obtained from 62 samples from two archaeological sites, Modlniczka sites 3 and 4, likely forming one large settlement. Only charred plant remains were taken into account. Among cultivated plants, two species of hulled wheat, Triticum dicoccon and Triticum monococcum, and common barley Hordeum vulgare were documented. Among wild plants, several taxa were found, including Chenopodium t. album, Ch. polyspermum, Fallopia convolvulus, Bromus sp. Numerous seeds of Chenopodium t. album indicates that this plant could have been used as part of a diet. In addition, hazelnut (Corylus avellana) shells were found.

We describe a new ranunculacean fruit from Ingersoll Shale sediments (Santonian, 85.5 to 83.5 Ma), a part of the Eutaw Formation as it occurs in eastern Alabama. The Ranunculales/Ranunculaceae are basal eudicots but their fossil record is not well documented which is most likely due to their taxa being predominantly herbaceous and therefore lacking a propensity for fossilization. Two fruits are in evidence, one is a mature fruit in the process of dehiscence and in which several seeds are describable, and the other is interpreted as a less mature fruit. From these fruits, we describe a new genus, Costellifructus Axsmith, Stults, Wang, et Boucher gen. nov., and species, Costellifructus alabamensis Axsmith, Stults, Wang et Boucher sp. nov. Both fruits are urceolate and display follicles that are fused at the base and maintain this fusion through the length of the main body of the fruit thus forming a capsule. The fusion of follicles is denoted by areas of depression on the fruit. Especially observable in the large fruit are follicular ridges which continue into long stylar extensions. Interestingly, this is a character which is also very recognizable on extant ranunculacean genera such as Aquilegia L. and Delphinium Tourn. ex L. Seeds are characterized as small (2.5 × 2 mm), rugose, ridged, obovate longitudinally, and trigonal in cross-section profile, properties fitting within some ranunculacean taxa.

Small pentamerous floral remains commonly encountered in Middle Miocene lake deposits of the Latah Formation of Washington and Idaho, USA, previously assigned to Diospyros, are here shown to represent an extinct genus. Newly recovered specimens preserve characters of the androecium and pollen that were previously unknown. Remberella microcalyx (Knowlton) gen. et comb. nov. flowers are actinomorphic, with five basally connate petals having an adnate androecium including ten staminodes and ten stamens. The elongate-triangular anthers contain finely rugulate, triaperturate pollen. The combination of pentamerous sympetalous corolla, ten staminodes in two whorls and ten stamens adnate to the corolla indicates affinity with early divergent superasterids, likely the Ericales, with intriguing similarities to Ebenaceae. Although the Miocene flora includes many genera confidently assigned to extant genera, Remberella adds to a growing number of contemporary extinct genera.

The western Amazon landscapes evolved during the Neogene–Quaternary in response to the effects of the Andean orogeny and dynamic topography. During the Miocene, sedimentary basins accumulated hundreds of meters of sediments that harbor the biological history of the region and, consequently, the emergence of the amazonian biome. Palynology is the main source of biostratigraphic and paleobotanical information, its use has allowed placing sedimentary and biological events during the Miocene in a chronological framework. Here, we present palynological data from core 1-AS-20-AM, located in the northeastern portion of the Solimões Basin and exposing the Solimões and Içá formations of Miocene and Pleistocene ages, respectively. Pollen samples were collected throughout the 286 meters of core and processed following standard palynology methods. We report well-known index species from zonation schemes in Colombia and Venezuela, adapted for use in western Amazonia, and place the Solimões Formation in core 1-AS-20-AM into the Middle to Late Miocene. The occurrence of Cyatheacidites annulatus, marker of zone T17, confirms the presence of the latest Miocene in the basin, recorded for the first time in cores. The Içá Formation in core 20AM is only tentatively assigned to zone T18 of Pliocene/ Pleistocene age. We discuss the possibility of a six-million-year hiatus between the formations. Several species are recorded at a topmost extant (Holocene) sample and can serve as calibration for last appearance events. We also detected a Middle Miocene marine incursion along ~60 meters at the bottom of the core. Ten new taxa are erected formally, some of which had been recorded informally elsewhere and will be useful for future biostratigraphic correlations. The new species also document the first occurrences of two plant groups for the Miocene of Amazonia, they are related to Cabomba (Cabombaceae), and Eichhornia/Pontederia (Pontederiaceae). The new data from core 1-AS-20-AM will be key for regional biozonation schemes and analyses of biodiversity emergence.