Proposed Symposium Title: AN UPDATE ON THE PHYLOGENY OF SEED PLANTS
Abstract: Elucidating the phylogenetic interrelationships of seed plants is challenging because our understanding of extinct taxa is poor, and the five living groups are morphologically distinct and unrepresentative of the diversity that existed in the past. The symposium will explore recent progress and opportunities for further advances through improved understanding of extinct seed plants, and the creative integration and interpretation of information from the genomes of living angiosperms, conifers, cycads, Ginkgo and Gnetales.
Speaker 1: Susana Magallon
Instituto de Biología, UNAM
s.magallon@ib.unam.mx
Integrating morphological and molecular perspectives on seed plant phylogeny
Speaker 2: Peter Crane
Oak Spring Garden Foundation
peter@osgf.org
The BEG group and the Bennettitales-Gnetales link
Speaker 3: Gongle Shi
Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology
glshi@nigpas.ac.cn
The unity and diversity of Mesozoic cupulate gymnosperms
Topics (Up to three): Paleobotany
Topic 2: Systematics
Topic 3: Macroevolution
Justification: It has been 40 years since the first attempt at elucidating phylogenetic relationships among living and fossil seed plants. Since then much progress has been made in developing a better understanding of the structure of living and fossil seed plants, their structural homologies, and fossil histories. In addition to an abundance of new data that have been gathered during these four decades, we have also seen many new methods of analysis. This symposium aims to provide a synthesis of what has been learned and what remains to be solved.
