But their origin and early evolution is a mystery. This is mainly owing to the lack of fossil flowers from the time period when the ancestor of living flowers is thought to have existed.

As a result, modern paleobotany has undergone a boom not unlike the Cretaceous flower explosion itself. Now old-style fossil hunters with shovels and microscopes compare notes with molecular ...

But in 1998, this ancient plant discovered in the fossil beds of Liaoning Province in northeastern China graced the cover of Science and made headlines worldwide. It was heralded as the earliest ...