Cooksonia

genus of plants (fossil)

Cooksonia is a prehistoric genus of land plant. Cooksonia dates back to the Middle Silurian, all the way to the Early Devonian.[1] Most fossils of Cooksonia were found in the United Kingdom in 1937.[3] Cooksonia is known as the earliest plant with a xylem, and so it is considered to be a transitional fossil between Bryophytes (Mosses and others) and Vascular Plants. [4]

Cooksonia
Temporal range: Wenlock to Early Devonian[1][2]
Reconstruction of Cooksonia
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom: Plantae
Superdivision: Polysporangiomorpha
Form taxon: Cooksonioidea
Genus: Cooksonia
Lang, 1937
Type species
Cooksonia pertoni
Lang, 1937

Only the sporophyte (or spore-bearing) phase of the plant is known, and was only a few centimeters tall. It does not have leaves or roots, though might be rooted through rhizomes.[2]

References

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  1. 1.0 1.1 Edwards, D. & Feehan, J. (1980), "Records of Cooksonia-type sporangia from late Wenlock strata in Ireland", Nature, 287 (5777): 41–42, Bibcode:1980Natur.287...41E, doi:10.1038/287041a0, S2CID 7958927
  2. 2.0 2.1 Boyce, C. Kevin (2008), "How green was Cooksonia? The importance of size in understanding the early evolution of physiology in the vascular plant lineage", Paleobiology, 34 (2): 179–194, doi:10.1666/0094-8373(2008)034[0179:HGWCTI]2.0.CO;2, S2CID 36688488
  3. Lang, W.H. (1937), "On the plant-remains from the Downtonian of England and Wales", Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 227 (544): 245–291, Bibcode:1937RSPTB.227..245L, doi:10.1098/rstb.1937.0004
  4. Freeman, Scott; Herron, Jon C. (2004). Evolutionary analysis (3rd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education. p. 816. ISBN 978-0-13-101859-4.