Givnish 2017 (Article) Bromeliaceae

WBC 2016 Seminar - One Hundred Million Years of Bromeliad Evolution

Author(s):—T.J. Givnish

Publication:—Journal of the Bromeliad Society 66(4): 200-225. (2017)

Abstract:—Western knowledge of bromeliads began little more than 500 years ago, with the discovery of pineapple on Guadeloupe by Columbus and his crew on their second voyage in 1493. But recent studies (Givnish et al. 2011, 2014) show that the history of the family Bromeliaceae itself began much, much earlier, about one hundred million years ago, at a time when Argentinosaurus – the largest of all dinosaurs – stalked the Earth, mammals had already diverged into their five modern lineages, the earliest bees had just evolved, and present-day families of birds would not begin diverging from each other for another five million years.