Mesozoic insects with ramified antennae

What is it about?

Antenna, as an important organ of detector, plays a special role in communication, locating meals and finding mate in insects. Antenna is also the one of the most multiform structures in insect, especially, many insects have very beautiful penniform or similar shape antennae, for example, a lot of living adult moth (Order Lepidoptera) possess refined feathered antennae. However, we have very limited knowledge about the origin and evolution of such antennae in insects. In our study, we found five specimens of insects with ramified antennae from the Lower Cretaceous of Yixian Formation (about 125 million years ago) of northeast of China. These Mesozoic insect, equipped with different feathery antennae, belong respectively to three orders of insect, caddisflies, scorpionfly and sawfly. This finding not only pushed ahead the records about such antennae by 10 million years, more importantly, the ramified antenna found among caddisflies and scorpionflis let us re-examine and think about the evolution of antenna in insects, because we never found any examples having similar antennae in these two groups before, in spite of extinct or extant ones.

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Why is it important?

1. Earliest records of insects with ramified antennae for their respective clades. 2. First time, we found feathery antenna in caddisflies and scorpionflies. 3. The presence of ramified in these Mesozoic insects constitute a convergence rather than a key innovation.

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