XVI International Botanical Congess

Recent analyses are largely concordant by resolving seed plants and flowering plants as monophyletic, while seed ferns and cycadophytes are para- or polyphyletic assemblages. Living conifers are monophyletic, but all fossil conifers may not belong to the clade. Gnetophytes and coniferophytes resolve as natural groups in some results and as para- or polyphyletic assemblages in others. Gymnosperms form a sister group to flowering plants in the results of some molecular analyses, but resolve as a paraphyletic grade by all other measures. Anthophytes appear to be a natural group, but composition of the clade varies among the results of several analyses. A relatively small number of characters appears to be crucial for understanding differences among the results of various analyses, and these provide a focus for studies to further resolve the spermatophyte clade.