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A catalogue of Burmite inclusions
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... Within the past 20 years, Burmese amber has become one of the most important fossil localities for our knowledge of mid-Cretaceous flora and fauna. By the middle of 2021 over 2,000 species had been described (Ross , 2019(Ross , 2021a(Ross , 2021b; also see Guo et al. 2017). Totally, 27 insect orders in 130 families had been reported by Grimaldi & Engel (2005), which numbers have greatly increased since then (Ross 2019(Ross , 2021a(Ross , 2021b. ...
The diagnosis of Palaeodysagrion cretacicus Zheng et al., 2016 is revised based on the description of a new specimen from mid-Cretaceous Burmese amber. Previously, only a fragmentary wing base was known from the holotype. The new specimen shows the complete wing venation of fore- and hind wings as well as large parts of the body anatomy. The new information proves that Palaeodysagrion youlini Zheng et al., 2017 has a very different venation and does not belong to the same genus. Therefore, a new genus Pseudopalaeodysagrion gen. nov. is erected for this species. Concurring with the results of Archibald et al. (2021), the “dysagrionine” taxa from Burmese amber are transferred from Dysagrionidae to Burmadysagrionidae stat. nov.
... Morphological information including descriptions of genus and species is presented with the discussion on the nymphal morphology. of the amber (Fig. 1). This amber originates from the Hukawng Valley, Kachin State in northern Myanmar where most arthropod inclusions from mid-Cretaceous have been reported from the area of Cretaceous marine sedimentary rocks (Guo et al., 2017;Jiang et al., 2020). For more detailed information of the amber deposit and its geological setting, see Cruickshank & Ko (2003) and Bai et al. (2016), and for recent lists of Burmese amber fossils described, see Ross (2019Ross ( , 2022. ...
The oldest Nabinae fossil, Cretanabis kerzhneri gen. et sp. nov., is described from mid-Cretaceous Burmese amber based on a well-preserved specimen. The morphology of the nymph fossil is presented with diagnosis and description. The comparison with the nymphs of groups within Nabinae and the usefulness of nymphal morphology are discussed.
... A number of recent scientific papers have described new species found in Mesozoic amber from East Asia, especially from Myanmar (Katagiri et al. 2013;Zheng et al. 2018b;Azar et al. 2019;Ross 2019). Studies have generally described organisms in great detail at small scales but have also interpreted their Mesozoic ecology (Zheng et al. 2016;Gu et al. 2017;Selden and Ren 2017;Xing et al. 2019). In this volume, five papers report and discuss fossil organisms encapsulated in Burmese amber. ...
Since the late twentieth century, palaeontological and geological evidence from East Asia has contributed to significant advances in the understanding of the Mesozoic world. Geological Society Special Publication 521 covers a wide range of topics that subdivide into four themes. These include: (1) clues and evidence from vertebrate fossils; (2) clues and evidence from invertebrate and plant fossils; (3) significant fossils from amber; and (4) palaeoenvironments and palaeoecosystems. The volume features 18 articles by 53 authors from different disciplines, including geochronology, palaeontology, stratigraphy, sedimentology, tectonics and geochemistry.
... Detailed measurements of all visible segments were made using a micrometer scale and a Leica M205 C binocular microscope. The locality of two specimens preserved in amber is situated in the North Myanmar, which has produced 525 families, 777 genera and 1013 insect species (Ross, 2018;Guo et al., 2017;Ross et al., 2010;Nicholson et al., 2015;Dlussky, 1996a;1996b;Ross & York, 2000;Rasnitsyn & Ross, 2000) and today 102 orders with hexapods, arachnids, centipedes, millipedes, crustaceans, onychophorans, molluscs, nematodes, annelids, amphibians, reptiles, theropods, protists, plants and fungi. U-Pb dating of zircons from the matrix which surrounds the amber have placed Burmite at 98.79 ± 0.62 Ma (Cenomanian) (Shi et al. 2012). ...
In the evolution of praying mantids, eusocial termites, cave cockroaches and the beetle/ant/bee/wasp-mimicking umenocoleoids, at a single Early Cretaceous diversification point (127 Ma) each lacked hierarchical structure, and independent explosive radiations are revealed. Adult male, female and individuals of unidentified sex of new cockroaches (Corydioidea, Fractaliidae fam. n.) sharing all the most important autapomorphies of these four major groups (raptorial legs, nuptial flight-related breaking sutura, hardened forewings and specialised cerci) represent a lineage of their common relatives supported by phylogenetic trees. Immature individuals suggest they were autochthonous to the source forests. They originate from the "tropical" Myanmar amber (70-98 Ma) and Upper Jurassic "subtropical" sedimentary rocks from Kazakhstan and Germany (151; 151 Ma) with supporting data from new most primitive representatives of predatory lineages from Lebanese "subtropical" and Taimyr "polar" ambers (ca. 127; 86 Ma).
... Le site fossilifère de l'État de Kachin, au Myanmar, se révèle d'une richesse exceptionnelle, ayant conduit ces dernières années à la découverte et à la description de nombreux taxons fossiles, notamment d'arthropodes terrestres (Guo et al., 2017 ;Ross, , 2020. Bien que plus de quatrevingt-dix familles de Coléoptères et trois cents espèces soient actuellement connues de l'ambre birman, les taxons attribués aux Scarabaeoidea demeurent cependant assez rares, et vraisemblablement, de nombreuses découvertes restent à faire. ...
Mémoire d'Habilitation à Diriger des Recherches -(HDR). Université de Bordeaux
The extinct Cretaceous ant genus Zigrasimecia Barden & Grimaldi, the “iron maiden ants” from Myanmar, is revised, and five new species are described: †Z. boudinoti sp. nov., †Z. caohuijiae sp. nov.,†Z. chuyangsui sp. nov., †Z. perrichoti sp. nov., and †Z. thate sp. nov. Zigrasimecia hoelldobleri paratype (CNU-HYM-MA2019054) is removed from the type series. New diagnoses for all species are provided and species boundaries are discussed. Studied specimens that are not ideally preserved are presented and discussed, some of them are putative new species. Two identification keys for the genus are provided, a traditional, dichotomous key and an interactive, multi-entry key hosted online at the website www.Xper3.fr. I briefly discuss the unlikeliness of the genus Boltonimecia to belong to the subfamily Zigrasimeciinae, and also the taxonomic problem caused by the description of species based on alates and poorly preserved fossils.
Frozen in time, captured forever. Extreme macro photography meets amber inclusions.
The resulting images reveal the beauty of nature, giving viewers a close encounter with biodiversity of the past.
Delicate flapping of wings, a fresh bite into prey, an intricate spider web and many more intricate wonders of nature, forever fossilized in resin.
AmberArt, a journey between Science and Beauty, takes you on a virtual tour highlighting the beauty of organisms encased in amber. With about 200 plates and more than 300 beautifully photographed animals and plants, you will encounter a mesmerizing world that was once buzzing with life.
Frozen in time, captured forever. Extreme macro photography meets amber inclusions.
The resulting images reveal the beauty of nature, giving viewers a close encounter with biodiversity of the past.
Delicate flapping of wings, a fresh bite into prey, an intricate spider web and many more intricate wonders of nature, forever fossilized in resin.
AmberArt, a journey between Science and Beauty, takes you on a virtual tour highlighting the beauty of organisms encased in amber. With about 200 plates and more than 300 beautifully photographed animals and plants, you will encounter a mesmerizing world that was once buzzing with life.
Fossils provide unique opportunity to understand the tempo and mode of evolution and are essential for modeling the history of lineage diversification. Here, we interrogate the Mesozoic fossil record of the Aculeata, with emphasis on the ants (Formicidae), and conduct an extended series of ancestral state estimation exercises on distributions of tip-dated combined-evidence phylogenies. We developed and illustrated from ground-up a series of 576 morphological characters which we scored for 144 extant and 431 fossil taxa, including all families of Aculeata, Trigonaloidea, Evanioidea, and †Ephialtitoidea. We used average posterior probability support to guide composition of a target matrix of 303 taxa, for which we integrated strongly filtered ultraconserved element (UCE) data for 115 living species. We also implemented reversible jump MCMC (rjMCMC) and hidden state methods to model complex behavioral characters to test hypotheses about the pathway to obligate eusociality. In addition to revising the higher classification of all sampled groups to family or subfamily level using estimated character polarities to diagnose nodes across the phylogeny, we find that the mid-Cretaceous genera †Camelomecia and †Camelosphecia form a clade which is robustly supported as sister to all living and fossil Formicidae. For this reason, we name this extinct clade as †@@@idae fam. nov. and provide a definition for the expanded Formicoidea. Based on our results, we recognize three major phases in the early evolution of the ants: (1) origin of Formicoidea as ground adapted huntresses during the Late Jurassic in the “stinging aggressor” guild (Aculeata) among various lineages of “sneaking parasitoids” (non-aculeate Vespina); (2) the first formicoid radiation during the Early Cretaceous, by the end of which all major extant linages originated; and (3) turnover of the Formicoidea at the end-Cretaceous leading to the second formicoid radiation. We conclude with a concentrated series of considerations for future directions of study with this dataset and beyond.
ELife digest
Many animals care for and protect their offspring to increase their survival and fitness. Insects care for their young using a range of strategies: some dig underground chambers for their young, whilst others carry their brood around on their own bodies. However, it was unclear when these strategies first evolved in insects.
Now Wang et al. report that they have discovered the earliest fossil evidence of an insect caring for its young, in the form of a female insect preserved with her brood in a specimen of ancient amber. The amber comes from northern Myanmar, where amber deposits are around 95–105 million years old. The fossilised insect is an adult female scale insect with a cluster of around 60 eggs on her abdomen. Six young scale insect nymphs are also preserved in the same piece of amber. Wang et al. named this newly discovered species Wathondara kotejai, after an earth goddess in South-East Asian Buddhist mythology and the late Polish entomologist Jan Koteja.
Most scale insect fossils found to date have been males. Fossilised adult females are scarcer, most likely because female scale insects are wingless and less mobile and therefore less prone to accidental burial. The fossil reported by Wang et al. is therefore a rare find, and it is also sufficiently well preserved to reveal that the female's eggs are contained within a wax-coated egg sac. Today there are many species of scale insects, most of which are parasites of plants and many are economically important pests of trees and shrubs. In living relatives of W. kotejai, females use a similar wax coating to protect themselves and their offspring: young nymphs hatch inside the egg sac and remain there for a few days before emerging into the outside world.
This new fossil provides a unique insight into the anatomy and life cycle of a long-extinct insect; it also demonstrates that brood care in insects is an ancient trait that dates back to at least around 100 million years ago at the height of the age of the dinosaurs.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.05447.002
Electrobisium acutum Cockerell is redescribed from a specimen cut from the block of Burmese amber containing the
holotype. The presence of strong spines on the carapace and tergites indicates that E. acutum may be closely related to extant South African or Taiwanese species of the genus Clyptocheiridium Chamberlin. Electrobisium and Cryptocheiridium are not synonymized, however, due to insufficient knowledge of E. acutum (the type species of Electrobisium) and problems with the definition of Cryptocheiridium. The superfamily Cheiridioidea, containing the families Cheiridiidae and Pseudochiridiidae, is removed from synonymy with the Garypoidea and regarded as the sister group of the Cheliferoidea.
This taxonomic list is based on Ross et al (2010) plus non-arthropod taxa and published papers up to the end of 2016. It does not contain unpublished records or records from papers in press (including on-line proofs) or unsubstantiated on-line records. Often the final versions of papers were published on-line the year before they appeared in print, so the on-line published year is accepted and referred to accordingly. Note, the authorship of species does not necessarily correspond to the full authorship of papers where they were described. The latest high level classification is used where possible though in some cases conflicts were encountered, usually due to cladistic studies, so in these cases an older classification was adopted for convenience. The classification for Hexapoda follows Nicholson et al. (2015), plus subsequent papers. † denotes extinct orders and families. The list comprises 31 classes (or similar rank), 85 orders (or similar rank), 375 families, 530 genera and 643 species. This includes 6 classes, 54 orders, 342 families, 482 genera and 591 species of arthropods.
Mid-Cretaceous amber has yielded to date twelve species assigned to six genera of the plant bug family Tingidae Laporte, 1832: Burmacader Heiss & Guilbert (2 sp.); Cucullitingis Du & Yao (1 sp.); Paraphatnomacader Guilbert & Heiss (1 sp.); Spinitingis Heiss & Guilbert (1 sp.); Tingiometra Heiss, Golub & Popov (4 sp.); Tingiphatnoma Guilbert & Heiss (2 sp.) (Du & Yao, 2018; Golub & Heiss, 2020; Guilbert & Heiss, 2018; Heiss, Golub & Popov, 2015; Heiss & Guilbert, 2013, 2018, 2019; Maksoud, Azar & Huang, 2019; Ross, 2019). A new genus and species Microtingis leptosoma gen. et sp. nov. is described and illustrated below.
The phylogeny of pleasing lacewings (Neuroptera: Dilaridae) is reconstructed for the first time based on morphological data using all fossil and extant genera. Accordingly, a revised generic classification of Dilaridae is proposed, with a new subfamily (i.e. Berothellinae subfam.n. ) erected based on its remarkably different morphological features from the other dilarid subfamilies. A revision of all dilarid genera is presented, including descriptions of some little‐known species from Asia and Mid‐Cretaceous Burmese amber. New genera and species herein described include Berothella holzschuhi U. Aspöck, Liu & H. Aspöck, sp.n. , Cretodilar burmanus Liu & Zhang, gen. et sp.n. , Dilar cretaceus Liu & Zhang, sp.n. , Neonallachius orientalis Liu, U. Aspöck & H. Aspöck, sp.n. and Neonallachius thailandicus Liu & Winterton, sp.n. Two new combinations, i.e. Neonallachius krooni (Minter, 1986), comb.n. and Neonallachius ponomarenkoi (Zakharenko, 1991), comb.n. , are proposed. Evolutionary patterns of some important characters and the historical biogeography of Dilaridae are also discussed.
This published work has been registered in ZooBank, http://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:68836312‐FBDC‐4F9F‐8516‐2365F44596BF .