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The broken parts of the tiny genitals of a small insect from the Cretaceous period were recently restored after spending more than a decade apart.
Researchers have described a new species of killer bug from a remarkably well-preserved fossil dating from around 50 million years ago. When the fossil was discovered in Colorado in 2006, it was split in two; when the rock around it was cracked in half, each half held half of the insect’s body. The division was almost perfect, but a tiny structure called a pygophore – the male insect’s genital capsule, the size of a grain of rice – was shattered in such a way that its original shape was obscured, scientists revealed. . in a report.
A fossil dealer then sold the two pieces to different buyers. But when the researchers put the fossil halves together and analyzed them together, their view of the genitals in their entirety allowed them to identify the bug as a new species, they reported in a new study.
Related: Ancient footprints of tiny ‘vampires’: 8 rare and unusual fossils
Killer bugs are highly effective predatory insects with around 7,000 recognized species but only around 50 known fossils, said study lead author Daniel Swanson, graduate student in entomology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. (UIUC).
“This speaks to the improbability of even having a fossil, let alone a fossil of this age, that offers so much information,” Swanson said in the statement. He and his colleagues published their findings on the fossil on Monday (January 19) in the newspaper Paleontology articles.
They nicknamed the new species Aphelicophontes danjuddi; the species name commemorates fossil collector Dan Judd, “in honor of his gracious donation of the matching specimen to the Illinois Natural History Survey’s paleontology collection,” the researchers wrote. . The genus of the insect comes from “aphelicus,” a Latin word for “old” and “phontes,” meaning “killer” or “murderer,” the researchers reported.
“Almost unheard of”
The insect, which measured 0.5 inches (12.4 millimeters) in length, had an elongated, slender body and alternating light and dark bands on its legs. Female assassin bugs are generally larger than males, so it’s likely that females of this species are larger than this specimen, scientists reported. Next to one of the legs is a small beetle that fossilized at the same time; While the killer virus may have attacked beetles, it is not known whether this particular beetle fell victim to the deadly attack from the larger insect, according to the study.
The pygophore, located at the bottom of the abdomen, is no more than 0.1 inch (3.1 mm) long. The unique characteristics of male genitals change rapidly, so they are often used to differentiate closely related species of killer bugs, the scientists reported.
This is not, however, the oldest fossil evidence of the genitals. This distinction belongs to a fossil of a type of arachnid called the reaper (or papa longlegs) which dates back around 400 million to 412 million years ago, during the Devonian period (416 million to 358 million years ago).
Two fossilized reapers, a man and a woman, were found with their respective genitals intact, at a site in present-day Scotland. In the fossils, paleontologists could see a penis in the male and an ovipositor, or egg-laying structure, in the female, researchers reported in 2003 in the journal. Paleontology.
“There are also many fossil insects in amber as old as the Cretaceous with preserved genitals,” said study co-author Sam Heads, paleontologist with UIUC’s Illinois Natural History Survey, in the press release. In one memorable example, a 41-million-year-old piece of amber preserved not only the genitals of a pair of flies, but also the timing of their use of their ugly pieces, capturing the snaking insects. mate, Live Science Previously reported.
However, the high-quality preservation of intact insect genitalia in rock, such as in the killer insect fossil, “is almost unknown,” Heads said.
Originally posted on Live Science.
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