Rate My Professor Richard Lupia

Lupia's research centers on paleobotany, palynology, and paleoecology. His primary focus examines vegetational changes during the Late Paleozoic Ice Age, from the latest Pennsylvanian through the Early Permian in Oklahoma and Kansas, using palynology of core and outcrop samples to document shifts from humid- to arid-adapted vegetation. Additional projects include the diversification of heterosporous ferns amid Cretaceous angiosperm expansion, mesofossil floras from the U.S. Atlantic and Gulf Coastal Plains analyzed via scanning electron microscopy for morphological evolution and insect-plant interactions, and taxonomy and anatomy of petrified wood floras from the Late Jurassic Morrison Formation in Oklahoma, Utah, and Montana to infer paleoecology and climate. He teaches courses such as History of Earth and Life, The Dynamic Earth, and Paleobotany. Key publications include "Mid-Cretaceous megaspore floras from Maryland, USA" (Journal of Paleontology, 2015), "Late Pennsylvanian–Early Permian vegetational transition in Oklahoma: Palynological record" (International Journal of Coal Geology, 2013), "Late Santonian megaspore floras from the Gulf Coastal Plain (Georgia, USA)" (Journal of Paleontology, 2011), and "Ferns Diversified in the Shadow of Angiosperms" (Nature, 2004).