《自然通讯》上周刊载了这篇论文。法国巴黎第十一大学的埃尔韦•索凯是论文的作者之一。他说，“现存的所有花朵都与它们的祖先不同，原因在于鲜花始祖存在于至少1.4亿年前，经过了相当长的时间才演变出今天的多样性。”

Dr Jason Hilton from the University of Birmingham, UK, who was not involved in the study, said: "The structure and organization of the ancestral flower has remained enigmatic. For instance, we don't know if the oldest flowers were unisexual or bisexual, or if they were pollinated by wind or insects."

英国伯明翰大学的杰森•希尔顿博士没有参加这项研究，他称：“鲜花始祖的结构和组织依然还是个谜。例如，我们不知道最古老的花朵是单性的还是双性的，或是依靠风还是昆虫授粉。”

To reconstruct the appearance of the first flower, the scientists recorded the features - such as the petals and sepals - of the flowers from 792 living species.

为了重现世上第一朵鲜花的外观，科学家记录了792种现存花卉的花瓣、萼片等外形特征。

They mapped the distribution of these features on to the evolutionary tree of flowering plants enabling them to build a picture of what flowers looked like at key points in their history - including the last common ancestor of all living flowers.

他们将这些特征分布绘制成开花植物的进化树，从而重现花卉在关键的进化节点上的样貌，其中就包括所有现存花卉的最后一个共同祖先的样子。

【花朵“始祖”长啥样?像白莲花和白百合结合体】相关文章：

★ 穆斯林世界抗议反伊斯兰影片

★ 英国内政部警告：中产专业人才外流

★ 法国奢侈品公司PPR计划收购麒麟珠宝

★ Lex专栏：昏睡的法国

★ 苹果的优势在于软件

★ 美国企业界广泛担忧财政悬崖

★ 英国应重写资讯自由

★ 快来体验免签证北京游

★ 时尚圈的博主们

★ 乌坎民主梦幻灭突显基层民主局限