The insect order Neuroptera, or net-winged insects, includes the lacewings, mantidflies, antlions, and their relatives. The order consists of some 6,000 species. Neuroptera is grouped together with the Megaloptera and Raphidioptera (snakeflies) in the unranked taxon Neuropterida.
Weald Clay or the Weald Clay Formation is a Lower Cretaceous sedimentary rock unit underlying areas of South East England, between the North and South Downs, in an area called the Weald Basin. It is the uppermost unit of the Wealden Group of rocks within the Weald Basin, and the upper portion of the unit is equivalent in age to the exposed portion of the Wessex Formation on the Isle of Wight. It predominantly consists of thinly bedded mudstone. The un-weathered form is blue/grey, and the yellow/orange is the weathered form, it is used in brickmaking.
Snakeflies are a group of predatory insects comprising the order Raphidioptera with two extant families: Raphidiidae and Inocelliidae, consisting of roughly 260 species. In the past, the group had a much wider distribution than it does now; snakeflies are found in temperate regions worldwide but are absent from the tropics and the Southern Hemisphere. Recognisable representatives of the group first appeared during the Early Jurassic. They are a relict group, having reached their apex of diversity during the Cretaceous before undergoing substantial decline.
A compression fossil is a fossil preserved in sedimentary rock that has undergone physical compression. While it is uncommon to find animals preserved as good compression fossils, it is very common to find plants preserved this way. The reason for this is that physical compression of the rock often leads to distortion of the fossil.
The Escucha Formation is a geological formation in La Rioja and Teruel provinces of northeastern Spain whose strata date back to the late Aptian to middle Albian stages of the Early Cretaceous. Dinosaur remains are among the fossils that have been recovered from the formation.
Coptoclavidae is an extinct family of aquatic beetles in the suborder Adephaga. The Coptoclavidae lived from the Late Triassic to the Early Cretaceous. Coptoclavidae is a member of the adephagan clade Dytiscoidea, which contains other aquatic beetles. Suggested reasons for their extinction to include the rise of teleost fish, or competition with Gyrinidae and Dytiscidae, which possess defensive secretions and sucking channels in the mandibles of larvae, which coptoclavids likely lacked. It has been suggested that the genus Timarchopsis and the subfamily Timarchopsinae are only distantly related to other coptoclavids based on cladistic analysis, with Timarchopsis being more closely related to geadephagans like carabids and trachypachids instead. Another study also suggested similarly for Coptoclavisca and possibly other coptoclaviscines.
The Tsagaantsav Formation, Tsagantsab Formation or Tsagan-Tsab Formation is an Early Cretaceous geologic formation in Mongolia. Indeterminate sauropod and psittacosaurid remains have been recovered from the formation. Remains of the pterosaur Noripterus, which were originally given their own genus, "Phobetor" have also been recovered from the formation.
Proraphidia is a genus of snakefly in the extinct family Mesoraphidiidae. The genus currently contains three species; Proraphidia gomezi from the La Pedrera de Rúbies Formation in Spain, Proraphidia hopkinsi from the Weald Clay in England, and the type species Proraphidia turkestanica from Kazakhstan. The genus was first described by O. M. Martynova in 1941 with the publication of P. turkestanica from Jurassic deposits of the Karabastau Formation in Karatau, Kazakhstan.
Protorabinae is an extinct subfamily of beetles in the family Carabidae. It contains 36 species in 13 genera, all extinct.
Hondelagia is an extinct genus of snakefly in the Priscaenigmatidae family. The genus has been described three times under the same taxonomy, but was initially described by A. Bode in 1953. It currently contains one species, the Hondelagia reticulata which was described by Bode in 1953. Its wing is 7 centimetres (2.8 in) in length and 3 centimetres (1.2 in) in width. It was found in Hondelage in Braunschweig. The genus was later described in 1992 by F. M. Carpenter and in 2002 by M. S. Engel. The genus' sister taxa is the extinct Priscaenigma. The species has no sister taxa.
Priscaenigma is an extinct genus of snakefly of the Priscaenigmatidae family which was described by Whalley in 1985. The fossils were found on flatstones at Black Ven in Charmouth, Dorset at 50.7°N 2.9°W in a marine environment of the Charmouth Mudstone Formation. The fossils were collected by J. F. Jackson between 1961 and 1963. Its sister taxa is Hondelagia. The genus contains one species, the extinct Priscaenigma obtusa, also described by Whalley in 1985. Its forewing is 12.6 centimetres (5.0 in) in length. Only a forewing was found when the species was discovered.
Austroraphidia is an extinct genus of snakefly in the family of Baissopteridae. Austroraphidia fossils were described by Willmann in 1994. The genus was later described by Michael S. Engel in 2002. It has five sister taxa; Baissoptera, Cretinocellia, Cretoraphidia, Cretoraphidiopsis and Lugala. Its fossils were found at the Crato MNHN collection in Brazil, often known as the Cretaceous of Brazil. It contains one species, the extinct Austroraphidia brasiliensis, which was described by Nel et al. in 1990. Its average body length is 12.3 centimetres (4.8 in), the forewing is 10.2 by 3.0 centimetres and the hindwing is 9.5 by 2.88 centimetres.
Mesoraphidiidae is an extinct family of snakeflies in the suborder Raphidiomorpha. The family lived from the Late Jurassic through the Late Cretaceous and is known from twenty-five genera. Mesoraphidiids have been found as both compression fossils and as inclusions in amber. The family was first proposed in 1925 by the Russian paleoentomologist Andrey Vasilyevich Martynov based on Upper Jurassic fossils recovered in Kazakhstan. The family was expanded in 2002 by the synonymizing of several other proposed snakefly families. The family was divided into three subfamilies and one tribe in a 2011 paper, further clarifying the relationships of the included genera.
Permosynidae is an extinct family of beetles known from the Permian to Cretaceous. It is sometimes treated as a form family, because all known members were described from fossils of isolated elytra with punctate striae.
This list of fossil arthropods described in 2011 is a list of new taxa of trilobites, fossil insects, crustaceans, arachnids and other fossil arthropods of every kind that have been described during the year 2011. The list only includes taxa at the level of genus or species.
Ademosynidae is an extinct family of beetles, known from the Late Triassic to Early Cretaceous. There are at least six genera and 11 species in Ademosynidae. Members of the family were small oval beetles, with a length generally smaller than 1 cm. Characteristics of the family include a pronotum without anterior angles and a rounded anterior margin, and elytra with 9–12 punctate striae. The systematic position of the family within the order Coleoptera is currently uncertain: they can be considered early examples of the suborder Polyphaga, or unusual examples of Archostemata.
2017 in paleoentomology is a list of new fossil insect taxa that were described during the year 2017, as well as other significant discoveries and events related to paleoentomology that were scheduled to occur during the year.
Aneuretopsychidae is an extinct family of scorpionflies known from the Mesozoic. Fossils are known from the Jurassic (Callovian-Oxfordian) to the early Late Cretaceous (Cenomanian). It is part of Mesopsychoidea, a group of scorpionflies with siphonate proboscis. They are suggested to have been nectarivores, feeding off the liquid pollination drops of and acting as pollinators for now extinct insect pollinated gymnosperms such as Bennettitales.
Orthophlebiidae is an extinct family of scorpionflies known from the Triassic to Cretaceous, belonging to the superfamily Panorpoidea. The family is poorly defined and is probably paraphyletic, representing many primitive members of Panorpoidea with most species only known from isolated wings, and has such been considered a wastebasket taxon.
Notocupes is an extinct genus of medium-sized archostematan beetles from the Mesozoic Era of Eurasia, including over 50 described species. Historically, the genus was classified as a member of the family Ommatidae, but the presence of characters such as the horizontal mandibular cutting edge, separated procoxae and overlapping abdominal sternites indicate that the genus may have a closer affinity with the family Cupedidae. Notocupes is considered to be a junior synonym of Zygadenia by Kirejtshuk (2020), but other researchers suggest to reserve the genus Zygadenia as a form taxon for isolated elytra that probably belong to the genus Notocupes, while retaining Notocupes as a valid genus for complete body fossils. Most species of Notocupes were described from compression fossils. An additional three species were described from Cenomanian-aged Burmese amber, which were treated as a separate genus, Echinocups, by Kirejtshuk (2020), but Li et al. (2023) consider Echinocups to be a junior synonym of Notocupes. Notocupes has a flattened body, which may suggest that it occupied narrow habitats, such as living under bark. Some species had serrated/spined margins of the carapace, which may have served as a defense against predators, or served as camouflage to resemble bark.
