Pollen is a powdery substance produced by flowers of seed plants. It consists of pollen grains, which produce male gametes. Pollen grains have a hard coat made of sporopollenin that protects the gametophytes during the process of their movement from the stamens to the pistil of flowering plants, or from the male cone to the female cone of gymnosperms. If pollen lands on a compatible pistil or female cone, it germinates, producing a pollen tube that transfers the sperm to the ovule containing the female gametophyte. Individual pollen grains are small enough to require magnification to see detail. The study of pollen is called palynology and is highly useful in paleoecology, paleontology, archaeology, and forensics. Pollen in plants is used for transferring haploid male genetic material from the anther of a single flower to the stigma of another in cross-pollination. In a case of self-pollination, this process takes place from the anther of a flower to the stigma of the same flower.
In biology, a spore is a unit of sexual(in fungi) or asexual reproduction that may be adapted for dispersal and for survival, often for extended periods of time, in unfavourable conditions. Spores form part of the life cycles of many plants, algae, fungi and protozoa.
Forensic palynology is a subdiscipline of palynology, that aims to prove or disprove a relationship among objects, people, and places that may pertain to both criminal and civil cases. Pollen can reveal where a person or object has been, because regions of the world, countries, and even different parts of a single garden will have a distinctive pollen assemblage. Pollen evidence can also reveal the season in which a particular object picked up the pollen.
Palynology is the "study of dust" or of "particles that are strewn". A classic palynologist analyses particulate samples collected from the air, from water, or from deposits including sediments of any age. The condition and identification of those particles, organic and inorganic, give the palynologist clues to the life, environment, and energetic conditions that produced them.
Micropaleontology is the branch of paleontology (palaeontology) that studies microfossils, or fossils that require the use of a microscope to see the organism, its morphology and its characteristic details.
A microfossil is a fossil that is generally between 0.001 mm and 1 mm in size, the visual study of which requires the use of light or electron microscopy. A fossil which can be studied with the naked eye or low-powered magnification, such as a hand lens, is referred to as a macrofossil.
Ernst Jakob Lennart von Post was a Swedish naturalist and geologist. He was the first to publish quantitative analysis of pollen and is counted as one of the founders of palynology. He was a professor at Stockholm University 1929–1950.
Dinocysts or dinoflagellate cysts are typically 15 to 100 µm in diameter and produced by around 15–20% of living dinoflagellates as a dormant, zygotic stage of their lifecycle, which can accumulate in the sediments as microfossils. Organic-walled dinocysts are often resistant and made out of dinosporin. There are also calcareous dinoflagellate cysts and siliceous dinoflagellate cysts.
Paul Bigelow Sears was an American ecologist and writer. He was born in Bucyrus, Ohio. Sears attended Ohio Wesleyan University, the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, and the University of Chicago.
Founded in 1943, the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) is a professional medical membership organization of nearly 6,800 allergist/immunologists and related professionals around the world with advanced training and experience in allergy, asthma and other immunologic diseases. The Academy is dedicated to the advancement of the knowledge and practice of allergy, asthma and immunology for optimal patient care.
Johannes Iversen was a Danish palaeoecologist and plant ecologist.
Lucy May Cranwell was a New Zealand botanist responsible for groundbreaking work in palynology. Cranwell was appointed curator of botany at Auckland Museum in 1929, when she was 21 years old. As well as her work on ancient pollen samples she was responsible for encouraging a love of botany in a generation of Auckland children.
A pollen calendar is used to show the peak pollen times for different types of plant pollen, which causes allergic reactions in certain people.
Otto Gunnar Elias Erdtman was a Swedish botanist and pioneer in palynology. With the publication of his 1921 thesis in German, pollen analysis became known outside Scandinavia. Erdtman systematically studied pollen morphology and developed the method of acetolysis in pollen studies. His handbook An introduction to pollen analysis was instrumental in the development of the discipline. In 1948, he created the palynological laboratory at the Swedish Museum of Natural History in Stockholm. He headed the laboratory until 1971, from 1954 with the title of professor.
Fort Center is an archaeological site in Glades County, Florida, United States, a few miles northwest of Lake Okeechobee. It was occupied for more than 2,000 years, from 450 BCE until about 1700 CE. The inhabitants of Fort Center may have been cultivating maize centuries before it appeared anywhere else in Florida.
The Micropalaeontological Society (TMS) is a scientific society based in the UK with international membership. It was founded in 1970 for the promotion of the study of micropalaeontology, the study of microscopic fossils.
The Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeosciences is an autonomous institute constituted under the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India. The institute is located at Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India and is a seat of higher learning in the field of plant fossil research.
Phyllis Draper, born on August 22, 1907, was a paleoecologist most notable for developing the first pollen diagram in North America in 1928. She began her career as a graduate student under Paul Sears, the chair of the botany department at the University of Oklahoma. Sears gave his students the freedom to explore unique topics in order to design their own theses. Draper took advantage of this, and during her time working and studying under Sears, she published two major papers entitled, "A Demonstration of the Technique of Pollen Analysis" and "A Comparison of Pollen Spectra of Old and Young Bogs in the Erie Basin." She believed that the fossil pollen could be used to make inferences about the climates of specific regions. Her first pollen graph showed the pollen in New Haven Bog, which included pteridophyte spores, grasses, pines, oak, and larch, and unknown pollen. She later updated this pollen diagram and developed another one for the Curtis Bog. Draper graduated from the University of Oklahoma in 1929 with an M.S. in botany. She died on August 8, 2000.
David J. Batten (1943–2019) was a British palynologist. He is best known for his work in Mesozoic terrestrial palynology and palynofacies analysis. His specific contributions include work on the Normapolles group of pollen in the Late Cretaceous and Early Tertiary, Mesozoic and Tertiary megaspores from around the world, palynofacies analysis to interpret past environments, and the palynology of the Wealden Group of southern England.
