Friday, November 2, 2018

[PaleoEntomology • 2018] A First Survey of Cretaceous Thrips from Burmese Amber including the Establishment of Rohrthripidae fam. n., A New Family of Tubulifera (Insecta: Thysanoptera); Myanmarothrips pankowskiorum & Rohrthrips burmiticus


Myanmarothrips pankowskiorum 
Ulitzka, 2018

    DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.4486.4.8 

Abstract
Burmite, a Cretaceous amber coming from the north of Myanmar, is known to preserve a great diversity of fossil arthropods, particularly insects. Many inclusions of different taxa in several insect orders have been well analysed, but this is the first study focussed on the Thysanoptera found in Burmite. In the sub-order Terebrantia, family Merothripidae, Myanmarothrips pankowskiorum gen. n., sp. n. is recognized in various amber samples from a total of 34 females but only one male. In the sub-order Tubulifera, Rohrthrips burmiticus sp. n. is based on a single female with a tubular tenth abdominal segment. This is an exceptionally well-preserved specimen, and details of the mouth parts indicate that the gnathal apparatus of modern Tubulifera was already developed in the Cretaceous. Due to plesiomorphic characters with respect to extant Tubulifera, the genus Rohrthrips is transferred to Rohrthripidae fam. n., and this family is clearly differentiated from extant Phlaeothripidae.

Key words: Burmite, Cenomanian, Myanmarothrips gen. n., Merothripidae, new species, new genus, new family, Rohrthripidae fam. n.


FIGURES 1–8. Myanmarothrips pankowskiorum gen. n., sp. n.
(1) female (MU-Fos-62/1), dorsal view; (2) female (MU-Fos63/1), dorsal view; (3) female (MU-Fos-63/1), head and prothorax; (4) female (MU-Fos-62/2), lateral view; (5) male (MU-Fos62/3b), dorsal view; (6) female (MU-Fos-63/1), trichobothria on abdominal tergite X (indicated); (7) fore wing (MU-Fos-62/ 3a), cross veins (indicated); (8) hind wing (MU-Fos-62/3b), membrane smooth with microthrichia present only at tip (indicated).

Manfred R. Ulitzka. 2018. A First Survey of Cretaceous Thrips from Burmese Amber including the Establishment of A New Family of Tubulifera (Insecta: Thysanoptera). Zootaxa. 4486(4); 548–558.   DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.4486.4.8