Eocene amber provides the first fossil record and bridges distributional gap in the rare genus Robsonomyia (Diptera: Keroplatidae)

Alicja Pełczyńska; Wiesław Krzemiński; Vladimir Blagoderov; Lars Vilhelmsen; Agnieszka Soszyńska

doi:10.1038/s41598-024-59448-y

Eocene amber provides the first fossil record and bridges distributional gap in the rare genus Robsonomyia (Diptera: Keroplatidae)

Sci Rep. 2024 Apr 22;14(1):9252. doi: 10.1038/s41598-024-59448-y.

Authors

Alicja Pełczyńska¹, Wiesław Krzemiński², Vladimir Blagoderov³, Lars Vilhelmsen⁴, Agnieszka Soszyńska⁵

Affiliations

¹ Faculty of Biology and Environmental Protection, Department of Invertebrate Zoology and Hydrobiology, University of Lodz, 90-237, Lodz, Poland. alicja.pelczynska@edu.uni.lodz.pl.
² Institute of Systematics and Evolution of Animals, Polish Academy of Sciences, 31-016, Kraków, Poland.
³ National Museums Scotland, Edinburgh, Scotland.
⁴ Natural History Museum of Denmark, SCIENCE, University of Copenhagen, Universitetsparken 15, 2100, Copenhagen, Denmark.
⁵ Faculty of Biology and Environmental Protection, Department of Invertebrate Zoology and Hydrobiology, University of Lodz, 90-237, Lodz, Poland.

Abstract

Until now, the genus Robsonomyia was represented by two extant species: R. reducta Matile & Vockeroth, 1980 from North America and R. sciaraeformis (Okada, 1939) from Asia. This paper presents the first fossil members of the genus Robsonomyia, which is also the first record from Europe. Two new fossil species from Baltic amber are described: R. baltica Pełczyńska, Krzemiński & Blagoderov, sp. nov. and R. henningseni Pełczyńska, Krzemiński & Blagoderov, sp. nov.. The presence of fossil Robsonomyia spp. on the European continent suggests Holarctic distribution of the genus in the past. We also discuss possible pathways of its intercontinental dispersion.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Amber*
Animals
Diptera* / anatomy & histology
Diptera* / classification
Europe
Fossils*

Substances

Amber

Grants and funding

2020/37/B/NZ8/03042/National Science Center Poland