During my PhD studies I plan to explore issues on flowering plants evolution and the origin of Neotropical rainforests. The early stages of diversification of flowering plants, the main components of modern tropical forests, occurred during the Cretaceous (from 142 to 65 million years ago), a period of very active tectonics and redistribution of landmasses that resulted in global temperatures and sea levels much higher than today. However, the plant fossil record from the Cretaceous of northern South America is very scarce and little is known about the initial stages of diversification of Neotropical forests prior to the Cretaceous/Paleogene boundary (K/T).