There was an explosion of

From the familiar wild daisies to bizarre orchids, extremely diverse flowers with numerous numbers. But in fact, they all exploded in a short era - an evolutionary " Big Bang " - about 130 million years ago.

The origin of flowering plants has long been a headache for scientists.

"One of the reasons why understanding the evolutionary relationship between large groups of flowering plants is difficult is that they divide in a short period of time," said researcher Robert Jansen, a professor of biology at the University. Texas state in Austin, said.

Two reports published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , revealing evolutionary relationships among large plant groups. The results showed that there was an explosion in the number of species over a period of 5 million years, right after the plant appeared on the earth, and created 5 lines of main flowering plants.

" Today's flowering plants include about 400,000 species, " said Pam Soltis, curator at the University of Florida's Museum of Natural History, saying: " It must be seen that their explosion occurs only in about 5 million years is amazing, especially if you know that they appeared at least 130 million years ago . "

All of today's flowering plants belong to 5 large lines, appearing massively in the period of about 5 million years.(Photo: LiveScience)

Pam and colleagues analyzed 61 genes of 45 plant species, while Jansen's group analyzed 81 genes from 64 species. Both groups focus on the chloroplast gene - the organ responsible for photosynthesis in all trees.

Then, they arranged the gene sequence into a diagram to reflect the relationship between the lines of plants through evolutionary history. From the length of the chart branches along with the speed of known gene changes, the research teams estimate that the three lines of plants have undergone a strong differentiation in an evolutionary " blink of an eye. "

However, the cause of this boom is still unclear. According to the researchers, it is possible that a major climate incident has triggered this process.

Thuan An