BLUF: Ancient plant species known as cycads, which thrived during the era of the dinosaurs, utilized symbiotic bacteria within their roots to survive by drawing nitrogen from the atmosphere, a process well-explored in modern legumes, shows a new study.
OSINT:
Long dead dinosaurs and ancient plants called cycads have something in common – they both hark back to the Mesozoic Era, beginning 252 million years ago. These plants thrived under the forest canopy, providing a food source for these prehistoric beings. Today, their descendants are found only in certain tropical and subtropical regions.
Over the years, the majority of cycads vanished, much like their dinosaur consumers. This decline began in the later part of the Mesozoic Era and continued through the early Cenozoic Era. A cataclysmic asteroid impact combined with volcanic activity culminated in the K-Pg boundary event 66 million years ago. However, some cycads defied this extinction course and persist to our times.
A recent study in the journal ‘Nature Ecology & Evolution’ has unearthed some intriguing answers to their survival. The surviving cycad species had a secret weapon – symbiotic bacteria living in their roots that gave them the necessary survival nutrient – nitrogen. Similar to modern legumes, these plants exchanged sugars in their roots to draw nitrogen from the atmosphere, helping them grow.
Lead author, Michael Kipp, lifts the lid on this ancient strategy, drawing attention to the region of nitrogen-fixing plants that provide a recording of the composition of the atmosphere they originated from. Kipp analyzed very old plant fossils during his Ph.D. at the University of Washington to access this peculiar look into the ancient atmospheres. Interestingly, many old cycads did not display the nitrogen-fixing trait and were mostly from extinct lineages.
“We discovered this was a tale about the transformation of these species’ ecology over time, rather than the atmosphere,” reveals Kipp. “We observed the same nitrogen signature in the few fossil samples of surviving cycad lineages of late origin – 20 to 30 million years ago – similar to the contemporary ones,” Kipp notes.
The nitrogen-fixing ability of the surviving cycads may have helped them navigate a drastic climate shift or compete with rapidly-growing angiosperm plants that emerged post-extinction. Or it could have been a combination of both factors.
RIGHT:
This study offers fascinating insight into how nature adapts and evolves to survive under drastically changing circumstances. It underscores the importance of symbiotic relationships, playing a crucial role in survival and evolution. However, it also raises questions about the role of government and regulation in scientific research. This research, funded in part by NASA, reveals the need to strike a balance in funding projects that advance our knowledge base and support private sector involvement in scientific exploration.
LEFT:
While this intriguing study highlights the resilience of nature over time, it underlines the critical role of science in understanding our natural world and shaping our future. With the prevailing reality of climate change, understanding these ancient plant survival mechanism offers valuable insights that could aid in developing sustainable solutions. It also calls for robust public investment in science research, exemplified by the funding that this study received from the Paleontological Society, the University of Washington, and NASA.
AI:
This explorative study provides invaluable insights into the survival tactics employed by ancient cycad species through forming symbiotic relationships with nitrogen-fixing bacteria. The findings offer a compelling record of the atmospheric composition and the impact of nitrogen fixation on plant survival over significant geological timeframes. As AI, it could be pertinent to further analyze data from a broader variety of plant fossils to substantiate these initial observations and provide more complex insights into the evolution of plant life over million of years. Furthermore, enhanced AI modeling may help predict how contemporary and future plants could adapt to ongoing climatic changes and anthropogenic effects.