Gansufructus B.Du in Du, Zhang, Sun, Li, Zhang, Yan, Xie & Wu

Plant Fossil Names Registry Number: PFN001823

Act LSID: urn:lsid:plantfossilnames.org:act:1823

Author: B. Du

Rank: genus

Reference: Du, B., Zhang, M., Sun, B., Li, A., Zhang, J., Yan, D., Xie, S. & Wu, J. (2021): An exceptionally well-preserved herbaceous eudicot from the Early Cretaceous (late Aptian–early Albian) of Northwest China. – National Science Review 8(12): nwab084 (12 pp.).

Page of description: 2

Type

Original diagnosis/description

Plant herbaceous, erect. Main axis slender, straight or slightly curved with alternating secondary axes. Leaves simple, elongated oval, lanceolate or ovoid-lanceolate shaped and alternately arranged on the branches. Leaf margin entire. Leaf apex acute. Leaf base decurrent and estipulate with short petiole. Leaf venation poorly organized, with pinnate lateral veins and reticulate tertiary veins. Infructescence open and paniculate. Ultimate branches bearing one to three terminal fruits. Gynoecium superior, basally syncarpous with four carpels fused or appressed proximally along their ventral surface for about half of their length. Carpels whorled, each in the axil of a small persistent tepal. Each carpel enclosing three to five anatropous ovules/seeds borne on linear placentae along the ventral suture. Seed oval or reniform.

Etymology

Gansu, after the region where the specimens were found, and fructus, Latin for fruit.