Palaeontinoidea
Encyclopedia
Palaeontinoidea is an extinct superfamily
of cicadomorphs
. It contains three families
.
-like insects that existed from the Upper Permian to the Middle Cretaceous (around 260.4 to 112.0 million years ago).
Superfamily
The term superfamily is used to describe several different concepts in different scientific fields:* Superfamily and Superfamily : a level of biological classification; redirects to Taxonomic rank...
of cicadomorphs
Cicadomorpha
The Cicadomorpha is the infraorder of the Hemiptera which contains the cicadas, leafhoppers, treehoppers, and spittlebugs. There are approximately 35000 described species worldwide...
. It contains three families
Family (biology)
In biological classification, family is* a taxonomic rank. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, genus, and species, with family fitting between order and genus. As for the other well-known ranks, there is the option of an immediately lower rank, indicated by the...
.
Description
Palaeontinoids were (usually large) cicadaCicada
A cicada is an insect of the order Hemiptera, suborder Auchenorrhyncha , in the superfamily Cicadoidea, with large eyes wide apart on the head and usually transparent, well-veined wings. There are about 2,500 species of cicada around the world, and many of them remain unclassified...
-like insects that existed from the Upper Permian to the Middle Cretaceous (around 260.4 to 112.0 million years ago).
Subdivisions
The three families classified under Palaeontinoidea, along with their age range and collection sites, are the following:- Mesogereonidae Tillyard, 1921
- Upper Triassic; AustraliaAustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
and South AfricaSouth AfricaThe Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
. Contains two monophyleticMonophylyIn common cladistic usage, a monophyletic group is a taxon which forms a clade, meaning that it contains all the descendants of the possibly hypothetical closest common ancestor of the members of the group. The term is synonymous with the uncommon term holophyly...
generaGenusIn biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...
.- Dunstaniidae Tillyard, 1916
- Upper Permian to Lower Jurassic; South AfricaSouth AfricaThe Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
, Australia, FranceFranceThe French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, Central AsiaCentral AsiaCentral Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...
, and ChinaChinaChinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
.- PalaeontinidaePalaeontinidaePalaeontinidae, commonly known as giant cicadas, is an extinct family of cicadomorphs. They existed during the Mesozoic era of Europe, Asia, and South America. The family contains around 30 to 40 genera and around a hundred species.-Discovery:...
Handlirsch, 1906
- Palaeontinidae
- Upper Triassic to Middle Cretaceous; BrazilBrazilBrazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
, ChinaChinaChinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
, RussiaRussiaRussia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, GermanyGermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, the TransbaikalTransbaikalTransbaikal, Trans-Baikal, Transbaikalia , or Dauria is a mountainous region to the east of or "beyond" Lake Baikal in Russia. The alternative name, Dauria, is derived from the ethnonym of the Daur people. It stretches for almost 1000 km from north to south from the Patomskoye Plateau and North...
region, TajikistanTajikistanTajikistan , officially the Republic of Tajikistan , is a mountainous landlocked country in Central Asia. Afghanistan borders it to the south, Uzbekistan to the west, Kyrgyzstan to the north, and China to the east....
, TurkmenistanTurkmenistanTurkmenistan , formerly also known as Turkmenia is one of the Turkic states in Central Asia. Until 1991, it was a constituent republic of the Soviet Union, the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic . Turkmenistan is one of the six independent Turkic states...
, KyrgyzstanKyrgyzstanKyrgyzstan , officially the Kyrgyz Republic is one of the world's six independent Turkic states . Located in Central Asia, landlocked and mountainous, Kyrgyzstan is bordered by Kazakhstan to the north, Uzbekistan to the west, Tajikistan to the southwest and China to the east...
, KazakhstanKazakhstanKazakhstan , officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Ranked as the ninth largest country in the world, it is also the world's largest landlocked country; its territory of is greater than Western Europe...
, SpainSpainSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
, and the United KingdomUnited KingdomThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
. Contains around 30 to 40 genera and about a hundred species.
See also
- HomopteraHomopteraHomoptera is a deprecated suborder of order Hemiptera; recent morphological studies and DNA analysis strongly suggests that the order is paraphyletic. It was therefore split into the suborders Sternorrhyncha, Auchenorrhyncha, and Coleorrhyncha....
- Prehistoric LepidopteraPrehistoric LepidopteraPrehistoric Lepidoptera are both butterflies and moths that lived before recorded history. The fossil record for Lepidoptera is lacking in comparison to other winged species, and tending not to be as common as some other insects in the habitats that are most conducive to fossilization, such as...
- Prehistoric insectsPrehistoric insectsPrehistoric insects are various groups of insects that lived before recorded history. Their study is the field of paleoentomology. Insects inhabited Earth since before the time of the dinosaurs. The earliest identifiable insect is the Devonian Rhyniognatha hirsti, estimated at...