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Issue: Vol. 8 No. 4: (In progress) August 2025
Type: Article
Published: 2025-08-29
DOI: 10.11646/palaeoentomology.8.4.12
Page range: 447-458
Abstract views: 285
PDF downloaded: 7

A new genus of diapriid wasp (Hymenoptera: Diaprioidea) from mid-Cretaceous Kachin amber with plesiomorphic fore wing venation

Univ Rennes, CNRS, Géosciences Rennes, UMR 6118, 35000 Rennes, France; Institut de Systématique, Évolution, Biodiversité (ISYEB), Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, EPHE-PSL, Université des Antilles, CP50, 57 rue Cuvier, F-75005 Paris, France; State Key Laboratory of Palaeobiology and Stratigraphy, Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 39 East Beijing Road, Nanjing 210008, China
Proctotrupomorpha taxonomy Mesozoic Myanmar Hymenoptera Diaprioidea Belytinae

Abstract

The parasitoid wasp family Diapriidae, and the Belytinae subfamily in particular, are abundant in the fossil record, yet understudied. In this contribution, a new genus and species of belytine wasp is described and illustrated, based on two males from the Cenomanian Kachin amber: Eoaclista exquisita gen. et sp. nov. The new taxon is particular as it retains the 1cu-a and 2cu-a veins as tubular on the fore wing, a character previously only found in the Monomachidae for the Diaprioidea superfamily. Eoaclista exquisita gen. et sp. nov. shows that the 2cu-a vein was still present in early diverging Diapriidae, and that it has been lost at least three times in the family, and five times in the superfamily. It also highlights that the relationships within the Diaprioidea are still poorly understood and that wing characters should be treated with caution in a phylogenetic context.

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