Darwin was once flummoxed as to how so many flowering plants evolved, but researchers may have finally cracked the code.

Flowering plants - from corn, wheat, rice and potatoes to maple, oak, apple and cherry trees as well as roses, tulips, daisies and dandelions and even the corpse flower and voodoo lily - are cornerstones of Earth's ecosystems and essential for humankind.

Using genomic data from more than 9500 species, biologists have mapped the evolutionary relationships between flowering plants

With their own botanical collection material and their research knowledge on the evolution of cruciferous plants (plants of the cabbage family), bioscientists at Heidelberg University have contributed to a large-scale international study that has produced a comprehensive "tree of life" for flowering plants.