Taxonomy Of Palaeontinidae(Insecta:Hemiptera)from The Cretaceous Of England And China

Palaeontinidae is an extinct family of the superfamily Palaeontinoidea(Insecta,Hemiptera)which first appeared in the late Triassic(Carnian),and probably went to its most prosperous stage in the Jurassic,became extinct in the Early Cretaceous(Aptian).The family declined sharply in the Early Cretaceous,mainly appeared in Siberia,China,Spain,England and Brazil.Thirteen specimens from the Lower Cretaceous Yixian Formation in western Liaoning and southeastern Inner Mongolia are described and attributed to four species within two genera of Palaeontinidae,of which two are new species:Ilerdocossus dissidens Li,Chen and Wang,2419 and Miracossus gongi Li,Chen and Wang,2019.Based on four fossils from the Weald Clay Formation in southern England,two new species of Palaeontinidae have been established:Ilerdocossus prowsei Li et al.,2019 and Valdicossus mikewebsteri Li et al.,2019.The fossil record of Cretaceous Palaeontinidae is systematically summarized,with a total of 35 species in 12 genera.Among them,12 species in 4 genera are known from China.Palaeontinidae occurred both in the northern and southern hemispheres in the Early Cretaceous and were adapted for living in the warm temperate and tropical zones during this sub period.Cretaceous Palaeontinidae may have originated in central or eastern Asia in the Middle Jurassic,and then spread to western Europe and South America in the late Jurassic.There is no palaeontinid fossil record in Europe by the late Aptian,which indicates that Palaeontinidae were widely distributed in Eurasia at the beginning and then migrated to South America in the Early Cretaceous;the family disappeared in Eurasia first,and then became extinct in South America.