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Issue: Vol. 8 No. 1: February 2025
Type: Correspondence
Published: 2025-02-28
DOI: 10.11646/palaeoentomology.8.1.3
Page range: 9-11
Abstract views: 141
PDF downloaded: 3

A new Saxonagrionidae (Insecta: Odonatoptera) from Southern France Middle Permian confirms the attribution of the family to Panodonata

Institut de Systématique, Évolution, Biodiversité (ISYEB) Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, EPHE-PSL, Université des Antilles, CP50, 57 rue Cuvier 75005, Paris, France
Institut de Systématique, Évolution, Biodiversité (ISYEB) Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, EPHE-PSL, Université des Antilles, CP50, 57 rue Cuvier 75005, Paris, France
Institut de Systématique, Évolution, Biodiversité (ISYEB) Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, EPHE-PSL, Université des Antilles, CP50, 57 rue Cuvier 75005, Paris, France
Institut de Systématique, Évolution, Biodiversité (ISYEB) Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, EPHE-PSL, Université des Antilles, CP50, 57 rue Cuvier 75005, Paris, France
Insecta Odonatoptera

Abstract

The superorder Odonatoptera Martynov, 1932 comprises a great number of clades (e.g., Meganisoptera, Protanisoptera, Triadophlebiomorpha, etc.) that could be considered as orders at the same rank of the extant Odonata (dragonflies, damsel-dragonflies and damselflies) (Nel & Piney, 2023). The Odonatoptera is very ancient, with representatives dating from the Serpukhovian (late Early Carboniferous) (Petrulevičius & Gutiérrez, 2016). But how old are the Panodonata Bechly, 1996, the clade containing the Odonatoptera with the synapomorphy ‘distal discoidal vein MAb (= distal side of discoidal cell) and subdiscoidal vein (origin of CuA on MP) aligned’ (Bechly, 2016)? Kohli et al. (2016) proposed the triassolestid Triassolestodes asiaticus (age ca. 237 Ma) as the oldest known representative of the crown Odonata because this family belongs to the Epiproctophora (the stem group of the extant Anisoptera). Kohli et al. (2021: fig. 4) dated the divergence between the Zygoptera and Epiproctophora as between 298 and 253 Ma, on the basis of the work of Kohli et al. (2016). Nel et al. (1999) and Prokop et al. (2015) described the two families assigned to Panodonata: Saxonagrionidae Nel, Gand, Fleck, Béthoux & Lapeyrie, 1999 and Huangiopteridae Prokop, Szwedo, Lapeyrie, Garrouste & Nel, 2015 on the basis of two wings from the Guadalupian of Lodève (Southern France).

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