First record of Styracoxylon (Styracaceae) from Southern Hemisphere: Arroyo Feliciano Formation (Upper Pleistocene), Entre Ríos, Argentina

MOYA, ELIANA; BREA, MARIANA; FRANCO, MARIA JIMENA

REVIEW OF PALAEOBOTANY AND PALYNOLOGY

ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV

Lugar: Amsterdam; Año: 2015 vol. 221 p. 211 - 219

0034-6667

A new species, Styracoxylon thyllosum sp. nov., is described from the Upper Pleistocene Arroyo Feliciano Formation of the Gualeguay Basin in eastern Argentina. It is the first unequivocal record of the Styracoxylon van der Burgh (1978) in South America and was previously known only from the Pliocene of the Rhine area, Netherlands. This fossil specimen was recovered in the Consorcio Paso Sociedad Locality (Federal, Entre Ríos, Argentina). The new fossil species is characterized by growth ring boundaries distinct, with diffuse-porouswood. Vessels are mostly in radial multiples of 2?6 elements, occasionally solitary and rarely in clusters. Tylosis is abundant. Perforation plates are usually scalariform (5?20 bars) and rarely simple. Intervessel pits are small,bordered, and alternate to opposite. Rays are frequently 2?4 (6) seriate and rarely uniseriate, heterocellular, and of two distinct ray sizes. Fibers are non-septate, with distinctly bordered pits, and rounded to hexagonal inoutline.The axial parenchyma is apotracheal diffuse and diffuse-in-aggregates, and in strands of 8?12 cells. Vascular tracheids possibly present.Wood anatomical features suggest a relationship with Styracaceae, and the fossil specimenshows affinity with the extant genus Styrax Linnaeus.