This award supports the U.S.-India Planning Visit: Floras of Antarctica and India, Implications for Gondwana Assembly and Paleoclimatology. Professor Sankar Chatterjee, Texas Tech University and Dr. Rajni Tewari, Birbal Sahni Institute of Paleobotany (BSIP)will undertake exchange visits in order to finalize a comparative study on the morphology and palynology of Glossopteris and Dicroidium floras. The collaborators will also study their utility in paleobiogeography and climate evolution, which has never been integrated or synthesized in any detail. Excellent collections of Permo-Triassic Gondwana floras from India are currently housed at the BSIP, and similar contemporary floras from Antarctica are at the Museum of Texas Tech University. This award supports a unique scientific collaboration between the two investigators who will study and compare the Permo-Triassic floras of India and Antarctica and explore their significance in paleobiogeography and paleoclimatology. The collaboration will integrate the expertise of the investigators and institutional resources, as well as strengthen the USPI?s proposal, which will be submitted to the GEO/EAR Sedimentary Geology & Paleobiology Program following this planning visit.
