Dinosaur extinction paved way for spread of grapes, study finds [Video]

The oldest grape fossil uncovered by scientists in a new study reveals how the extinction of dinosaurs paved the way for the spread of the fruit and its related species across the globe.

The research, published in the journal Nature Plants, found fossilised grape seeds ranging from 60 to 19 million years old in Colombia, Panama, and Peru.

One of these represents the earliest known example of a grape family species in the Western Hemisphere, say researchers from Chicago’s Field Museum.

“This discovery is important because it shows that after the extinction of the dinosaurs, grapes really started to spread across the world,” Fabiany Herrera, a curator from the museum, said in a statement.

The findings show that the extinction event that killed the dinosaurs not only impacted the planet’s animals …