Salopella

Salopella is a form genus for small fossil plants of Late Silurian to Early Devonian age. The diagnostic characters are naked axes branching isotomously, terminating in fusiform sporangia.^[1] The sporangia are unbranched, but in at least the type species the axes seem to branch just under the sporangia.^[2] It differs from the similar form genus Tortilicaulis in that the sporangia do not have spirally arranged cells, and from other similar form genera such as Cooksonia, Uskiella and Tarrantia in the shape of the sporangia.

Salopella Temporal range: Late Silurian–Early Devonian PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N
Rough 3D rendering of Salopella. Scale cube: 1 mm
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
Clade:	Tracheophytes
Stem group:	†Rhyniophytes
Genus:	†Salopella Edwards & Richardson 1974[1]
Species
S. allenii Edwards & Richardson 1974 S. australis Tims & Chambers 1984 S. brasiliana Mussa et al. 1996 S. caespitosa Tims & Chambers 1984 S. marcensis Fanning et al. 1992 S. xinjiangensis Dou Yawei & Sun Zhehua 1983

Species have been reported from Wales, Xinjiang, Brazil and Australia. Most species are based on very small fragments of the tips of plants, the exceptions being the two Australian species which preserve rather more of the plant. The relationships of the genus are not clear because many anatomical details remain unknown. A useful summary table of what data is known was given by Edwards et al.^[3] It has been considered to be a member of the rhyniophytes.^[4][5]

References

1. Edwards, D.; Richardson J.B. (1979). "Lower Devonian (Dittonian) plants from the Welsh borderland". Palaeontology. 17 (2). 311–324.
2. Edwards, D.; Fanning, U. (1985). "Evolution and environment in the late Silurian-early Devonian: the rise of the pteridophytes". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. B. 309 (1138): 147–165. Bibcode:1985RSPTB.309..147E. doi:10.1098/rstb.1985.0076.
3. Edwards, D.; Fanning, U.; Richardson J.B. (1994). "Lower Devonian coalified sporangia from Shropshire: Salopella Edwards & Richardson and Tortilicaulis Edwards". Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society. 116 (2): 89–110. doi:10.1006/bojl.1994.1055.
4. Gensel, P. (1980). "Devonian in situ spores: a survey and discussion". Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology. 30: 101–106. doi:10.1016/0034-6667(80)90009-3.
5. Hao, Shougang & Xue, Jinzhuang (2013). The early Devonian Posongchong flora of Yunnan: a contribution to an understanding of the evolution and early diversification of vascular plants. Beijing: Science Press. p. 329. ISBN 978-7-03-036616-0. Retrieved 2019-10-25.