The oldest trees on the planet had a more complex morphology than today, according to a study by researchers at the University of Cardiff, which was published this week by the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) .
The research is based on discoveries made in fossilized remains of trees of the family Cladoxylopsida, 374 million years ago, in which you can see an intricate system of woody filaments.
The scientists observed in a group of petrified trunks that these filaments, which are called xylem and whose function is the conduction of liquids in vascular plants, formed an entire interconnected network that propagated on the outside of the plant.
In existing tree families, the xylem forms a single cylinder whose growth, year after year, occurs in the form of a ring just below the bark.
In the case of fossils, however, this development was very different, since each plant had different filaments which, in turn, developed their own rings.
In this way, as the different filaments grew, the plant was also developed, thus expanding the volume of its trunk.
In addition, according to the study, the different interconnections among the xylem had the ability to relocate in order to adapt to the growth of the tree.
“There has not been, as far as I know, no other tree that has ever done anything as complex as this,” says Cardiff University researcher Chris Berry, one of the co-authors of the study.
“The tree was capable of tearing the skeleton and collapsing under its weight, while it remained alive and growing in all directions to become the most dominant plant of its time.”
Source: http://bit.ly/2zDwx56
