Roolitubina

Roolitubina is a genus of fossilized tubulophytes from the Mesozoic Era, discovered in Mongolia. It belongs to the phylum Chlorophyta, a group of chlorophyll-containing algae. The genus was named by Novichkova, a Russian paleobotanist, in a 1985 paper.

The characteristics of Roolitubina are known through several well-preserved and fragmentary specimens found in the Bissekty Formation, a geological formation of lamite and dolomite rocks from the Early Cretaceous period. These fossils were discovered in what is now western Mongolia, in the region of the Turkic-speaking Dörbet Mongol aymag. They include elongated, tubular cells and what appears to be braided walls. Lyophytes like Roolitubina are classified based on unique branching patterns and cell shapes.

The oldest Vascular plant reported in Mongolia and much of Asia is dated to 350 million years ago but of those the study of Roolitubina estimates its time to be nearly 135 million years ago, during the Aptian and Early Albian. However, the Cretaceous to early Paleogene has been extensively studied in these regions. The discovery of numerous fossil finds during the Cretaceous not only of plant fossils, but several others, provides a wealth of data for interpetation of the Cretaceous Period and its)||arian impact on this region of the world.