Richard Lupia

Assistant Professor of Geology and Geophysics
Assistant Curator of Micropaleontology and Paleobotany,
Sam Noble Museum of Natural History

Ph.D., 1997, University of Chicago
M.S., 1994, University of Chicago
B.A., 1991, University of Pennsylvania

Office: SEC 932
Phone: 405-325-7229
Fax: 405-325-3140
E-mail: rlupia@ou.edu

Areas of Interest

Paleobotany and Micropaleontology

Research

My primary research focuses on the early evolutionary radiation of flowering plants during Cretaceous. I am interested in relating observed patterns of taxonomic, phylogenetic, morphological, and ecological diversification in flowering plants, with patterns and processes of environmental change occurring during the Cretaceous. My research integrates field collecting, laboratory research including light and scanning electron microscopy, and literature surveys to examine and test paleoecological patterns. Current research focuses on the documentation and comparison of the diversity and abundance of plant species in three classes of fossils-palynomorphs (pollen and spores), macrofossils (leaves) and mesofossils-that have been recovered from Cretaceous deposits during fieldwork and collecting from the Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia. I am also interested in and have been developing quantitative methods for examining spatial and temporal patterns in the distribution of fossil plant taxa within paleoenvironments.

Courses Taught

The Dynamic Earth

History of Earth and Life

Paleobotany

Selected Publications

Lupia, R., S. Lidgard, and P. R. Crane. 1999. Comparing palynological abundance and diversity: implications for biotic replacement during the Cretaceous angiosperm radiation, Paleobiology 25.

Lupia, R. 1999. Discordant morphological disparity and taxonomic diversity during the Cretaceous angiosperm radiation: North American pollen record, Paleobiology 25:1-28.

Lupia, R., P. R. Crane, and S. L. Lidgard, in press. Angiosperm diversification and mid-Cretaceous environmental change, In S. J. Culver and P. F. Rawson, eds. Biotic Responses to Global Change: The Last 145 Million Years, Cambridge University Press.

Herendeen, P. S., S. Magallón-Puebla, R. Lupia, P. R. Crane, and J. Kobylinska. in press, A preliminary conspectus of the Allon flora from the Late Cretaceous (late Santonian) of central Georgia, USA, Annals of the Missouri Botanical Garden.

Sims, H. J., P. S. Herendeen, R. Lupia, R. A. Christopher, and P. R. Crane, in press. Fossil flowers with Normapolles pollen from the Late Cretaceous of southeastern North America, Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology.

Lupia, R. 1995, Paleobotanical data from fossil charcoal: an actualistic study of seed plant reproductive structures, Palaios 10:465-477.

end of Content<-->