Zhe-Kun Zhou

Chinese Academy of Sciences | CAS · Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden

Alpine treelines serve as vital indicators of the impacts of climate change on tree growth and forest distribution. They offer valuable insights into how shifting temperature and precipitation patterns affect ecosystems in treeline ecotones. Analyzing the age structure of tree stands at treelines provides a glimpse into how different generations of...

The growth of the Tibetan topography changed the climate and ecosystem in eastern Asia during the Cenozoic. Here, we briefly summarize previous research results on the impact of Tibetan topographic evolution using proxy and numerical modeling data on both the hydrologic cycle and the ecosystem of eastern Asia. To date, the topographic evolution of...

The complex tectonic evolution in the Tibetan region has impacted climate, the Asian monsoon system, and the development of major biodiversity hotspots, especially since the onset of the India-Eurasia continental collision during the early Paleogene. Untangling the links between the geologic, climatic, and ecological history of the broader region c...

Dipteronia, now endemic to East Asia, was widely distributed in North America during the Paleogene; however, its fossil records in Asia are scarce and none are of the Neogene. Here, we report the first Neogene Dipteronia samaras from South Korea. The more complete fossil records suggest that Dipteronia possibly originated in either Asia or North Am...

The genus Albizia is one of the largest genera in the Fabaceae (the legume family). It is a pantropical genus of ecologically, economically, and chemically important trees, shrubs, and lianas. Fossil records of the genus have been extensively documented from the late Eocene to Pleistocene in Asia. However, no Albizia fossils have been reported from...

Plant fossils play an important role in understanding landscape evolution across the Tibetan Region, as well as plant diversity across wider eastern Asia. Within the last decade or so, paleobotanical investigations within the Tibet Region have led to a paradigm shift in our understanding of how the present plateau formed and how this affected the r...

滇西北-西藏和滇东南-桂西是我国西南植物区系中两个面貌和谱系年龄差异最为鲜明的区域，分别以区系年轻、草本植物和区系古老、木本植物为特征。其中一个饶为有趣的问题是这两个地区的区系分异现象是如何演变形成的？而古植物学研究能为回答以上问题提供重要证据。本文报道分别发现于滇西北-西藏和滇东南-桂西的椿榆属(Cedrelospermum)和臭椿属(Ailanthus)化石新纪录。结合已有研究，这两个类群在我国西南的化石历史为：椿榆属见于西藏中始新世至晚渐新世(C. tibetica)及滇东南晚始新世(C. asiaticum)地层，而臭椿属化石见于西藏中始新世至晚始新世(A. maximus)及滇东南晚始新世至早渐新世(A. confucii)地层。以上古近纪滇西北-西藏和滇东南-桂西植物区系在属级水...

During the Miocene Climatic Optimum, a global long-term warm interval, European mid-latitude regions experienced a subtropical palaeoclimate. In particular, areas in eastern Germany were part of a vegetational zone with evergreen broadleaved forests, characterized by subtropical taxa. Regional palaeofloristic concepts denominated this palaeovegetat...

Podocarpium is an extinct genus in Fabaceae with rich fossil records in Eurasia dating back to the Eocene. However, the diversification and biogeographic histories of Podocarpium are poorly known due to a lack of fossils in some key regions, such as the Tibetan Plateau, an area recently shown to be crucial for floristic exchanges worldwide in the g...

Spinescence is an important functional trait possessed by many plant species for physical defence against mammalian herbivores. The development of spinescence must have been closely associated with both biotic and abiotic factors in the geological past, but knowledge of spinescence evolution suffers from a dearth of fossil records, with most studie...

The growth of the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau (QTP) during the Cenozoic drove dramatic climate and environmental change in this region. However, there has been limited comprehensive research into evolution of climate during this interval. Here we present a quantitative reconstruction using Bioclimatic Analysis (BA) and Joint Probability Density Functio...

新生代青藏高原持续生长, 气候环境经历了剧烈变化, 但是其气候演变缺乏综合性研究. 文章整合了青藏高原地区古近纪和新近纪(66~2.58Ma)共48个化石点的植物大化石和孢粉数据, 采用生物气候分析法和联合概率密度函数法定量重建了重要的古气候参数, 两者的结果均表明: 从古近纪至新近纪, 青藏高原的温度和降水呈现波动降低的趋势. 利用HadCM3模型对青藏高原古近纪和新近纪不同时期进行古气候模拟, 结果显示: 自晚始新世, 温度和降水量的分布规律主要受地形地貌的影响, 温度由之前的纬度分布格局转变为由地形地貌主导的分布格局; 随着青藏高原东北向生长, 温度降低和降水减少的范围向高原的东北方向扩展. 通过综合对比植物化石数据定量重建、模型模拟和其他代理指标恢复的古气候, 结果表明: 青藏高原隆...

植物化石在青藏高原形成过程、植物系统演化和高原生物多样性格局演变的研究中, 发挥着不可替代的作用. 近十年来, 青藏高原新生代植物学研究取得重要进展, 主要包括: (1) 大量新类群被发现. 在西藏新生代植物记录中, 一共发表了63个新种, 其中45个是2010年以后发表的, 占全部新种的70%以上. 这些新种不少是其所在科、属在亚洲乃至全球最早的化石记录, 因此青藏高原是亚洲植物区系的重要源头. (2) 古近纪青藏高原是全球植物区系交流的十字路口, 是植物区系交汇的一个港湾. 目前的古植物地理学研究表明, 该地区植物区系成分的传播和交流, 有进入青藏、走出青藏、走出印度和进出非洲4种模式. (3) 植物化石见证了青藏高原差异隆升的历史. 古高程重建发现古近纪青藏高原中部存在东西向的亚热带中...

Biodiversity hotspots are key regions for understanding the evolutionary history of biodiversity as well as the processes initiating and maintaining it [...]

Quantifying the interactions between topography, climate and plant diversity within one of the world's biodiversity hotspots, the southeastern margin of the Tibetan Plateau, remains elusive due to few reliable quantitative paleoelevation reconstructions, precise geological age constraints and well-preserved plant fossils. The Lühe Basin, on the sou...

Cupressaceae fossil tree stumps from the early Oligocene Lühe coal mine in southwestern China contain abundant quartz-petrified damage traces. The wood fossils were assigned to Taxodioxylon (very similar to extant Taxodium) based on wood anatomy analysis. Within the woods, three types of arthropods- and one fungus-mediated ichnofossils LHIF 1–4 (Lü...

Interannual variability in the global land carbon sink is strongly related to variations in tropical temperature and rainfall. This association suggests an important role for moisture-driven fluctuations in tropical vegetation productivity, but empirical evidence to quantify the responsible ecological processes is missing. Such evidence can be obta...

The fossil record evidences an old origin and diversification of Malvaceae in the Northern Hemisphere. The central Tibetan Plateau was at a low elevation with a monsoon influence during the Eocene, allowing the development of a subtropical flora containing Malvaceae. The taxonomic study of fossils from the Eocene of what is now the Tibetan Plateau...

The antiquity of the tropical Asian flora is being revealed by recent detailed work on a number of Cenozoic plant megafossil sites, some of which have been radiometrically dated for the first time, but our knowledge of how the highly diverse modern biota came into being remains poor due to a sparsity of records. In this paper, we describe fossil pl...

Extant Bauhinia (Leguminosae) is a genus of 300 species of trees, shrubs, and lianas, widely distributed in pantropical areas, but its diversification history in southeastern Asia, one of its centers of highest diversity, remains unclear. We report new fossils of three Bauhinia species with cuticular preservation from the Paleogene of Puyang Basin,...

Sambucus L. (Adoxaceae) has a rich fossil record with a major concentration in Europe and North Asia but a scarcity in relatively low latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere. Herein, we report fossil endocarps of the genus from the late Pliocene Heqing Basin of northwestern Yunnan, South China, which are assigned to two species, namely S. alveolatisem...

Two new fossil taxa of the ash tree, namely F. zlatkoi Meng-Xiao Wu et J.Huang sp. nov. and Fraxinus cf. honshuensis Tanai et Onoe were reported from the early Oligocene of the Lühe flora, Yunnan Province, Southwest China. The fruit traits were used to assign the proposed species to the genus Fraxinus. These traits were a flattened and symmetrical...

Yunnan province, which only accounts for 4.1% of Chinese territory area, however, is the most biodiverse province in China. It harbors 19 333 higher plant species, which is more than half of higher plants in China, including 1 906 species of mosses belonging to 499 genera in 126 families, 1 363 species of fern belonging to 193 genera in 61 families...

The genus Mucuna Adans. (Papilionoideae, Fabaceae) contains approximately 105 extant species. It is widely distributed in pantropical areas, with its center of diversity located in Asia. Recent molecular phylogenetic analyses investigated the historical biogeography of the genus; however, a lack of fossil evidence has limited a fuller understanding...

During the late Eocene to the early Oligocene, marine records document a globally congruent record of declining carbon dioxide concentrations, Antarctic icesheet growth, and associated reorganisation of the global climate system. In contrast, the few existing terrestrial records demonstrate high heterogeneity of environmental change and are difficu...

Sclerophyllous evergreen broad-leaved forests, mainly made up of sclerophyllous oak, Quercus section Heterobalanus (Øerst.) Menitsky, Fagaceae, represent the most typical forest type in the Hengduan Mountains. Their distribution pattern is closely related to the growth and formation of the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau (QTP). The oldest fossil record of...

Recent paleobotanical investigations in Vietnam provide a good opportunity to improve our understanding of the biodiversity and paleoclimatic conditions in the geological past of Southeast Asia. Palms (Arecaceae) are a diverse family of typical thermophilous plants with a relatively low tolerance for freezing. In this study, we describe well-preser...

The Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau (QTP) played a crucial role in shaping the biodiversity in Asia during the Cenozoic. However, fossil records attributed to insects are still scarce from the QTP, which limits our understanding on the evolution of biodiversity in this large region. Fulgoridae (lanternfly) is a group of large planthopper in body size, whic...

The sedimentary basins of Yunnan, Southwest China, record detailed histories of Cenozoic paleoenvironmental change. They track regional tectonic and palaeobiological evolution, both of which are critically important for the development of modern floral diversity in southwestern China and throughout Asia more generally. However, to be useful, the se...

Quantifying how land surface height, such as that of the Tibetan region, has changed with time is crucial for understanding a range of Earth processes, including atmospheric dynamics, biotic evolution and tectonics. Elevation reconstructions are highly uncertain and controversial, in part because of assumptions used in their calculation. The larges...

While a recent molecular phylogeographical study shows that, Cladrastis, a small woody genus in the bean family (Leguminosae), may have been established in Asia after the middle to late Eocene, fossils of the genus have not been previously documented in the Paleogene of Asia. Here we report an infructescence and four fossil fruits of Cladrastis fro...

The Hengduan Mountains region (HMR) on southeastern Tibetan Plateau, supports a high diversity of herbs, particularly in its subalpine to alpine ecosystems due to high altitude and cool temperate climate. Current understandings on the formation of such herbaceous richness is based chiefly on molecular phylogenies, while direct geological evidence i...

The West Kunlun region forms the northern margin of the Tibetan Plateau, and sedimentation in this region contributed to plateau formation and its northwards expansion, as well as the development of central Asian aridification. However, the stratigraphic dating framework in this region has been ambiguous, hampering the understanding of both tectoni...

The growth of the Tibetan Plateau throughout the past 66 million years has profoundly affected the Asian climate, but how this unparalleled orogenesis might have driven vegetation and plant diversity changes in eastern Asia is poorly understood. We approach this question by integrating modeling results and fossil data. We show that growth of north...

In this paper, we review evidence for a major biotic turnover across the Oligocene/Miocene in the Tibetan Plateau region. Based on the recent study of six well-preserved fossil sites from the Cenozoic Lunpola and Nima basins in the central Tibetan Plateau, we report a regional changeover from tropical/subtropical ecosystems in the Late Oligocene ec...

Determining whether the high-latitude Bering land bridge (BLB) was ecologically suitable for the migration of mesothermal plants is significant for Holarctic phytogeographic inferences. Paleobotanical studies provide a critical source of data on the latitudinal positions of different plant lineages at different times, permitting assessment of the e...

Significance The ancient topography of the Tibetan Plateau and its role in biotic evolution are still poorly understood, mostly due to a lack of fossil evidence. Our discovery of ∼47-Mya plant fossils from a present elevation of 4,850 m in central Tibet, diminishes, significantly, that lack of knowledge. The fossils represent a humid subtropical ve...

Tree-rings from upper forest boundary including treelines provide reliable indications of climatic changes as tree growth at treelines is highly sensitive to climate (temperature and moisture). Tibetan Plateau (TP) includes the highest elevation treeline in the world, and they show both temperature as well as moisture as a critical climatic factor...

Tree-rings from upper forest boundary including treelines provide reliable indications of climatic changes as tree growth at treelines is highly sensitive to climate (temperature and moisture). Tibetan Plateau (TP) includes the highest elevation treeline in the world, and they show both temperature as well as moisture as a critical climatic factor...

The Tibetan Plateau was built through a succession of Gondwanan terranes colliding with Asia during the Mesozoic. These accretions produced a complex Paleogene topography of several predominantly east-west trending mountain ranges separated by deep valleys. Despite this piecemeal assembly and resultant complex relief, Tibet has traditionally been t...

Menispermaceae are a pantropical and temperate family with an extensive fossil record during the Paleogene, especially in North America and Europe, but with much less evidence from Asia. The latest fossil evidence indicates a succession of tropical to sub‐tropical flora on the central Tibetan Plateau during the Paleogene. However, the biogeographic...

Icacinaceae are well represented in the modern tropical flora of East Asia, but this family has no confirmed macrofossils from this region. Most of the unambiguous fossils (e.g., endocarps) are from the Paleogene of North America and Europe, where the family is no longer present. Here we report a fossil endocarp of the liana genus Iodes from the Ol...

The Asian paleotropical flora is characterized by abundance of endemic species, high biodiversity, and complex geological and climatic histories. However, the main driving mechanism underlying such high tropical biodiversity remains unclear. Hence, the present study aims to investigate the biogeographic origin of the Asian paleotropical flora by tr...

Illigera (Hernandiaceae) is a liana genus distributed mainly in the tropical Asia and Africa. Previous fossil records suggested that Illigera was restricted in western North America during the Eocene. Recent paleobotanical investigation has unveiled a Paleogene flora that is totally different from today's vegetation in central Tibet. This provides...

Herbivore damage patterns on fossil leaves are essential to explore the evolution of plant-herbivore interactions under paleoenvironmental changes and to better understand the evolutionary history of terrestrial ecosystems. The Eocene–Oligocene transition (EOT) is a period of dramatic paleoclimate changes that significantly impacted global ecosyste...

The early Oligocene represents the beginning of the modern icehouse world. To better understand how vegetation and climate changed during this period, we reconstruct quantitively the early Oligocene vegetation and climate by analyzing fossil spore and pollen assemblages from Lühe basin, Yunnan Province, in southwestern China. The reconstructed pale...

Ceratophyllaceae Gray is a cosmopolitan submersed family in angiosperm. The fossil record is mainly composed of fruits ranging in age from the Cretaceous to the Neogene within the Northern Hemisphere. However, its fossil record in Asia is sparse. Here we report on a fossil fruit attributed to Ceratophyllum aff. muricatum Cham. from the early middle...

Yunnan at southeastern margin of the Tibetan Plateau is subject to frequent wildfires each year, while its wildfire history remains poorly known due to the lack of studies on palaeofire in the region. In this study, we report a local fire from the late Pliocene of northwestern Yunnan, based on macroscopic fossil charcoals recovered from the Sanying...

Holding particular biological resources, the Tibetan Plateau is a unique geologic-geographic-biotic interactively unite and hence play an important role in the global biodiversity domain. The Tibetan Plateau has undergone vigorous environmental changes since the Cenozoic, and played roles switching from "a paradise of tropical animals and plants" t...

Premise: Apocynaceae is common in the fossil record, especially as seed remains from the Neogene of Europe and North America, but rare in Asia. Intrafamilial assignment is difficult due to the lack of diagnostic characters, and new fossil and modern data are needed to understand the paleobiogeography of this group. Methods: We studied three Apoc...

Three fossil species of Equisetum (Equisetaceae) were reported from the Neogene of south-western China and northern Vietnam, based on well-preserved rhizomes with tubers. Equisetum cf. pratense Ehrhart from the middle Miocene of Zhenyuan County, Yunnan Province, China is characterised by a bunch of three ovate tubers with longitudinal ridges on the...

A new fossil occurrence of Ostrya (Betulaceae) is reported based on 14 involucre impressions from the lower Oligocene of Lühe Basin, Yunnan Province, Southwest China. They are characterized by their bladder-like shape with longitudinal veins and perpendicular or branched intercostal veins that form a reticulate venation. The discovery of these foss...

This paper describes a plant megafossil assemblage from the Pliocene strata of Xiangzi, Zanda Basin in the western Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Twenty-one species belonging to 12 genera and 10 families were identified. Studies show that the Pliocene vegetation in Zanda Basin was mostly deciduous shrub composed of Cotoneaster, Spiraea, Caragana, Hippophae...