Ep. 403 - Fossil Bryophytes Revisited

In Defense of Plants Podcast

In Defense of Plants

Botany, Natural Sciences, Ecology, Nature, Plants, Science

4.8 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 8 January 2023

⏱️ 46 minutes

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Summary

The odds of any living material becoming fossilized are extremely rare, especially if that living thing is a moss, liverwort, or hornwort. It does happen, however, and my guest today is dedicating his career to studying and understanding what bryophyte fossils can tell us. We revisit a conversation with Alex Bippus, who at the time was a PhD student at Oregon State, to learn about his fascinating work studying fossilized bryophytes. From climate change to evolution, there seems to be no end to the fun of studying bryophyte fossils. This episode was produced in part by Paul, Karen, Randi, Caelan, Tom, Don, Susan, Corbin, Keena, Robin, Peter, Whitney, Kenned, Margaret, Daniel, Karen, David, Earl, Jocelyn, Gary, Krysta, Elizabeth, Southern California Carnivorous Plant Enthusiasts, Pattypollinators, Peter, Judson, Ella, Alex, Dan, Pamela, Peter, Andrea, Nathan, Karyn, Michelle, Jillian, Chellie, Linda, Laura, Miz Holly, Christie, Carlos, Paleo Fern, Levi, Sylvia, Lanny, Ben, Lily, Craig, Sarah, Lor, Monika, Brandon, Jeremy, Suzanne, Kristina, Christine, Silas, Michael, Aristia, Felicidad, Lauren, Danielle, Allie, Jeffrey, Amanda, Tommy, Marcel, C Leigh, Karma, Shelby, Christopher, Alvin, Arek, Chellie, Dani, Paul, Dani, Tara, Elly, Colleen, Natalie, Nathan, Ario, Laura, Cari, Margaret, Mary, Connor, Nathan, Jan, Jerome, Brian, Azomonas, Ellie, University Greens, Joseph, Melody, Patricia, Matthew, Garrett, John, Ashley, Cathrine, Melvin, OrangeJulian, Porter, Jules, Griff, Joan, Megan, Marabeth, Les, Ali, Southside Plants, Keiko, Robert, Bryce, Wilma, Amanda, Helen, Mikey, Michelle, German, Joerg, Cathy, Tate, Steve, Kae, Carole, Mr. Keith Santner, Lynn, Aaron, Sara, Kenned, Brett, Jocelyn, Ethan, Sheryl, Runaway Goldfish, Ryan, Chris, Alana, Rachel, Joanna, Lori, Paul, Griff, Matthew, Bobby, Vaibhav, Steven, Joseph, Brandon, Liam, Hall, Jared, Brandon, Christina, Carly, Kazys, Stephen, Katherine, Mohsin Kazmi Takes Pictures, Manny, doeg, Daniel, Tim, Philip, Tim, Lisa, Brodie, Bendix, Irene, holly, Sara, and Margie.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello everyone and welcome to the In Defensive Plants podcast, the official podcast of
0:04.1	Indefensiveplants.com. What's up? This is your host, Matt. Welcome to the show. How's everyone
0:07.9	doing this week? Happy New Year. I hope everyone had a fun and safe New Year's Eve, but most importantly,
0:13.2	here is to a whole new year of botanical adventures in 2023. Today, we're going back into the
0:20.0	history of the Indefensive Plants podcast to revisit a topic
0:22.8	that is really fascinating, and I just wanted to bring it back up and put it on everyone's
0:27.0	radar, and that is fossilized bryophytes, mosses, hornworts, liverworts, things like that.
0:32.4	And as you can imagine, the fossilization process is already a rare event.
0:36.6	Now imagine that for plants that don't really create a lot of hard tissues.
0:40.2	And this is especially true if you go back to the earliest days of landplant evolution.
0:44.9	This conversation was held back in 2018 with then PhD student Alex Bippus, but today he is now Dr. Alex Bippus.
0:52.7	And his passion for fossilized bryophytes is intoxicating, but the process that he uses to study them makes it just that much cooler. Before I get to that, I just want to say my book is still 30% off over at mango.BZ, and that is until the end of the month. You can get all of the titles for 30% off as well. Once again, just head on over to mango.bZ and pick up a copy of that. But that is entirely enough rambling for me. Let's
1:15.6	just get on with the show. Without further ado, here's my conversation with Dr. Alex Bibbis.
1:19.9	I hope you enjoy. All right, Alex Bippis, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. How about you tell
1:37.3	everyone a little bit about who you are and what it is you do? Hi, thanks for having me. I really
1:42.2	appreciate it coming on. I love your show and really happy to be
1:45.3	here. Thank you. I'm a PhD student in the Department of Botany and Plant Pathology at Oregon State.
1:51.8	Actually just started. I did my orientation here today. Congrats. And I study fossil bryophytes.
1:57.6	And I use them to understand bryophyte evolution.
2:01.3	Awesome.
2:04.9	And we got a lot to talk about today, but I'm really curious.
2:11.1	What brought you to plants and how did you go from plants to paleobotany, or am I assuming it started that way?
	...

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