Scientists have identified a 125 million to 130 million-year-old freshwater plant, a contemporary of dinosaurs, as one of earliest flowering plants on Earth.
The finding, represents a major change in the presumed form of one of the planet’s earliest flowers, known as angiosperms, researchers said.
“This discovery raises significant questions about the early evolutionary history of flowering plants...,” said David Dilcher, paleobotanist at the Indiana University in US.
The aquatic plant, Montsechia vidalii, once grew abundantly in freshwater lakes in what are now mountainous regions in Spain.