''Elephantomyia (Elephantomyia) brevipalpa'' is an

extinct Extinction is the termination of an organism by the death of its Endling, last member. A taxon may become Functional extinction, functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to Reproduction, reproduce and ...

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

crane fly A crane fly is any member of the dipteran superfamily Tipuloidea, which contains the living families Cylindrotomidae, Limoniidae, Pediciidae and Tipulidae, as well as several extinct families. "Winter crane flies", members of the family T ...

in the

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Limoniidae Limoniidae is the largest of four crane fly families, with more than 10,700 species in more than 150 genera. Some studies have suggested it to be a paraphyletic group, with some limoniids being more closely related to Tipulidae and Cylindrotomida ...

. The species is solely known from the

Middle Eocene The Eocene ( ) is a geological epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (Ma). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period in the modern Cenozoic Era. The name ''Eocene'' comes from the Ancient Greek (''Ēṓs'', ' Dawn') a ...

Baltic amber Baltic amber or succinite is amber from the Baltic region, home of its largest known deposits. It was produced sometime during the Eocene epoch, but exactly when is controversial. It has been estimated that this forested region provided the re ...

deposits in the

Baltic Sea The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by the countries of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden, and the North European Plain, North and Central European Plain regions. It is the ...

region of Europe. The species is one of six described from Baltic amber.

History and classification

''Elephantomyia (Elephantomyia) brevipalpa'' is known from the

holotype A holotype (Latin: ''holotypus'') is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of s ...

specimen, collection number MB.J.337, along with two further adults which are preserved as inclusions in transparent Baltic amber. As of 2015, two of the amber specimens were included in the collections of the

University of Göttingen The University of Göttingen, officially the Georg August University of Göttingen (, commonly referred to as Georgia Augusta), is a Public university, public research university in the city of Göttingen, Lower Saxony, Germany. Founded in 1734 ...

, while the third was housed at the

Polish Academy of Sciences The Polish Academy of Sciences (, PAN) is a Polish state-sponsored institution of higher learning. Headquartered in Warsaw, it is responsible for spearheading the development of science across the country by a society of distinguished scholars a ...

. Baltic amber is recovered from fossil bearing rocks in the Baltic Sea region of Europe. Estimates of the age date between 37 million years old, for the youngest sediments and 48 million years old. This age range straddles the middle Eocene, ranging from near the beginning of the Lutetian to the beginning of the Pribonian. ''E. brevipalpa'' is one of six crane fly species in the genus '' Elephantomyia'' described from the Baltic amber, the others being '' E. baltica'', '' E. bozenae'', '' E. irinae'', '' E. longirostris'', and '' E. pulchella''. All six species are placed into the ''Elephantomyia'' subgenus ''Elephantomyia'' based on the lack of tibial spurs and by several aspects of the wing morphology. The fossil was first studied by entomologist

Hermann Loew Friedrich Hermann Loew (19 July 1807 – 21 April 1879) was a German entomologist who specialised in the study of Diptera, an order of insects including Fly, flies, mosquitoes, gnats and midges. He described many world species and was the first s ...

of the

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

, with his

type description A species description is a formal scientific description of a newly encountered species, typically articulated through a scientific publication. Its purpose is to provide a clear description of a new species of organism and explain how it differ ...

of the new species being published in 1851 as '' Toxorhina brevipalpa'', though he published the

nomen nudum In Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy, a ''nomen nudum'' ('naked name'; plural ''nomina nuda'') is a designation which looks exactly like a scientific name of an organism, and may have originally been intended to be one, but it has not been published ...

name a year earlier. The species was moved to the genus '' Limnobiorhynchus'' in 1860 by

Carl Robert Osten-Sacken Carl Robert Osten-Sacken or Carl-Robert Romanovich, Baron von der Osten-Sacken, Baron Osten Sacken (21 August 1828, – 20 May 1906) was a German-Russian diplomat and entomologist. He served as the Russian consul general in New York City duri ...

, and later moved by Osten-Sacken again, this time to the genus ''Elephantomyia''. The fossil was reexamined and the species redescribed in 2015 by paleoentomologist Iwona Kania of the

University of Rzeszów The University of Rzeszów () is a public university located in Rzeszów, Poland. It was established on September 1, 2001 through the merger of several higher education institutions in the city, including the Rzeszów branch of the Maria Curie-S ...

, who examined the holotype and the two additional specimens.

Description

The ''E. brevipalpa'' type specimen and one of the additional specimens are preserved males, while the third specimen is a female that is approximately long, not including the

rostrum Rostrum may refer to: * Any kind of a platform for a speaker: **dais **pulpit ** podium * Rostrum (anatomy), a beak, or anatomical structure resembling a beak, as in the mouthparts of many sucking insects * Rostrum (ship), a form of bow on naval ...

. The head has a rostrum that is long, as half the length of the fore-wing and the abdomen. The rostrum has notably short palpus at the tip. Each palpus is composed of four segments, totaling less than half the length of the glossal lobes on the rostrum. The third segment is an elongate cylinders while the fourth is very short. The antennae are small, composed of an elongated scape and widened

pedicle Pedicle or pedicel may refer to: Human anatomy *Pedicle of vertebral arch, the segment between the transverse process and the vertebral body, and is often used as a radiographic marker and entry point in vertebroplasty and kyphoplasty procedures ...

. As the flagellomeres progress from the base to the tip of the antennae they change from squat and crowded together to elongated. The basal flagellomeres have no setae, while three setae are found on flagellomeres 6 and 7. Flagellomeres 8 through 11 have two elongated setae, and the apical flagellomere has four very elongate setae. The wings are long with a pale brown

pterostigma The pterostigma (plural: pterostigmata) is a group of specialized cells in the outer wings of insects, which are often thickened or coloured, and thus stand out from other cells. It is particularly noticeable in dragonflies, but present also in ...

that is oval in shape and further towards the wing base then in other Baltic amber species. The Rs vein, as designated by the

Comstock–Needham system The Comstock–Needham system is a naming system for insect wing veins, devised by John Comstock and George Needham in 1898. It was an important step in showing the homology of all insect wings. This system was based on Needham's ''pretracheat ...

, is as about one third the length of the connected R₂₊₃₊₄ vein.

References

External links

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q20817817 Limoniidae Eocene insects of Europe Taxa named by Hermann Loew Fossil taxa described in 1851 Diptera of Europe Baltic amber