European Palaeobotany and Palynology Conference 2026

The detection and documentation of rare, early angiosperm fossil pollen remain challenging due to low abundance in Lower Cretaceous deposits and limitations of traditional palynological microscopy approaches. The newly developed All-in-One Mounting Method (A1MM) introduces a correlative microscopy approach for the detection and documentation of fossil pollen, while enabling a higher sample throughput. A1MM integrates scanning electron microscopy (SEM), light microscopy (LM) and fluorescence microscopy (FM) with optional downstream Airyscan imaging. Combining SEM, LM and FM imaging facilitates efficient detection and sufficient documentation of early angiosperm pollen as exemplified in material from Portugal (Barremian). SEM provides information on exine ornamentation, while LM and FM contribute complementary information on the grain’s overall morphology, aperture type and exine architecture. Subsequent Airyscan imaging may complement the obtained information with insights on the pollen wall ultrastructure. Permanently mounted material on microscope slides preserves the spatial context of the pollen and produces a permanent record of the specimen for potential typification of new taxa. The A1MM workflow is designed to produce correlative and complementary information on the pollen grains. The digital dataset of complementary visualization techniques enables morphological comparison and taxonomic revision. Datasets generated with A1MM may contribute to emerging digital palynology approaches and may bridge these with traditional LM and SEM approaches.