This course is taught by Prof. Mihai Emilian Popa and it covers the structure, stratigraphy and palaeoecological significance of various types of algae and green plant bioclasts (phytoclasts) recorded in sedimentary rocks. This course is taught in English by Prof. Mihai Emilian Popa for graduate students of School of Geoscience and Technology, Southwestern Petroleum University, Chengdu, Sichuan. The main topics detailed during the course are:

1. Siliceous algae (Silicoflagellatea, Bacillariophyta);

2. Calcareous algae (Chrysophyta, Chlorophyta, Charophyta, Rhodophyta) and stromatolites (Cyanobacteria);

3. Cellulose algae with or without exine cysts (Dinophyta, Acritarcha, Chlorophyta, Rhodophyta, Phaeophyta);

4. Sapropelic coals: kukersite, torbanite, tasmanite, shungite, etc.

5. Green plants (Cormophyta): their tissues, organs and modes of preservation of organic matter;

6. Humic coals: lithotypes, microlithotypes, macerals;

7. Coal balls and carbonate permineralisation in Carboniferous paralic mires;

8. Silicified woods in volcanoclastic sequences.

References
Miao, F., Qian, L., Zhang, X., 1989. Peat forming materials and evolution of swamp sequences - case analysis of a Jurassic inland coal basin in China. International Journal of Coal Geology 12, 733-765.

Stach, E., Mackowsky, M.T., Teichmuller, M., Taylor, G.H., Chandra, D., Teichmuller, R., 1975. Stach's textbook of Coal Petrology. Stuttgart: Gebruder Borntraeger.

Tappan, H., 1980. The paleobiology of plant protists. San Francisco: Freeman.

Taylor, G.H., Teichmuller, M., Davis, A., Diessel, C.F.K., Littke, R., Robert, P., 1998. Organic petrology. Berlin: Gebruder Borntraeger.

Taylor, T.N., Taylor, E.L., Krings, M., 2009. Paleobotany: the biology and evolution of fossil plants. Amsterdam: Elsevier.

Other courses taught by Prof. Mihai Emilian Popa (page in Romanian).