Kekveus brevisulcatus sp. nov., a new featherwing beetle from mid-Cretaceous amber of northern Myanmar (Coleoptera: Ptiliidae)

PeerJ. 2023 May 11:11:e15306. doi: 10.7717/peerj.15306. eCollection 2023.

Abstract

Ptiliidae (featherwing beetles) is a group of minute staphylinoid beetles with a scarce fossil record. Here a second member of the Mesozoic genus Kekveus Yamamoto et al. is reported from mid-Cretaceous Burmese amber, with detailed morphology obtained through confocal microscopy. Kekveus brevisulcatus Li, Yamamoto, Newton & Cai sp. nov. shares with K. jason Yamamoto et al. the unpaired medial pronotal fovea and narrowly separated transverse metacoxae, but can be separated from the latter based on its less elongate body, shorter pronotal foveae, and much weaker transverse depression on the head. Our phylogenetic analyses support the discheramocephalin affinity of Kekveus, although its relationship with other members of Discheramocephalini cannot be confidently resolved.

Keywords: Burmese amber; Fossil; Phylogeny; Ptiliidae.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Amber
  • Animals
  • Coleoptera*
  • Fossils
  • Myanmar
  • Phylogeny

Substances

  • Amber

Grants and funding

Financial support was provided by the Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDB26000000), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (42072022, 42222201, 42288201), and the Second Tibetan Plateau Scientific Expedition and Research project (2019QZKK0706). Yan-Da Li is supported by a scholarship granted by the China Scholarship Council (202108320010). Shûhei Yamamoto is supported by the Grant-in-Aid for JSPS Fellows (20J00159) from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.