Alexrasnitsynia permiana, Prokop, Jakub & Nel, Andre, 2011

Prokop, Jakub & Nel, Andre, 2011, New Middle Permian palaeopteran insects from Lodeve Basin in southern France (Ephemeroptera, Diaphanopterodea, Megasecoptera), ZooKeys 130, pp. 41-55 : 42-44

Alexrasnitsynia permiana sp. n. Figs 2 A–B

Material.

Holotype LdLAP 318A (Lapeyrie collection, prints of two identical wings), stored at the Musée of Lodève, France.

Type strata and locality.

Middle Permian, Guadalupian, Mérifons Member, Salagou Formation, Lodève, Languedoc, France ( Garric 2000; Béthoux et al. 2002).

Diagnosis.

That of the family.

Description.

Wing 11.8 mm long, 3.9 mm wide; ScP simple, ending in costal margin near mid part of wing, a narrow area between it and C without visible crossveins; area between C and RA relatively broad, 0.6 mm wide, with a row of simple oblique crossveins; RA simple ending on anterior wing margin 0.4 mm from wing apex; RP separating from RA 2.6 mm from wing base; RP with six-seven branches and covering a broad area with series of crossveins; CuA, MP, and MA diverging at the same point, 1.3 mm from wing base; MA very closely parallel to radial stem and reaching RP, fused with it for 0.6 mm, and separating again distally, MA simple, slightly curved; MP simple; CuA with three short distal branches; a series of crossvein s between MP and CuA; a broad area between CuA and CuP with crossveins; one anal vein preserved at least.

Discussion.

As the two wings show the same convexity of the veins and are very close, they are likely to be a fore- and a hindwing of the same specimen, but it is impossible to determine which one is the forewing. Alexrasnitsynia has a pattern of wing venation characteristic of many Diaphanopterodea ( Martynoviidae , Biarmohymenidae , Asthenohymenidae , Rhaphidiopsidae , etc.), i.e. crossveins distinct, archedictyon absent, stems of M and R very close; CuA, MP and MA diverging at the same point; MA very closely parallel with radial stem and distally fused for a short distance with RP. Alexrasnitsynia differs from all the known representatives of this order, except Parelmoa Carpenter, 1947 and Permuralia Sinichenkova & Kukalová-Peck, 1997 in the very broad area between RA and anterior wing margin with several long simple oblique crossveins. It differs from these two last genera in vein MA strongly approximating radial stem, a very broad area between CuA and CuP, and CuA with weak secondary posterior branches ( Carpenter 1947, 1992; Kukalová-Peck and Sinichenkova 1992; Sinichenkova and Kukalová-Peck 1997).

Note that the Upper Carboniferous monotypic family Velisopteridae Pinto & Adami-Rodrigues, 1997 is based on a fossil that seems to have none of the diaphanopterid characters listed above ( Pinto and Adami-Rodrigues 1997). Its attribution to this order should be verified. The Permian genus and species Walasua maculata Tan, 1980 is based on a very fragmentary wing. It has some similarities with Alexrasnitsynia in the posterior branches of RP regularly organised, partial fusion of MA with RP, MA closely parallel to R, but structures like area between RA and costal margin, CuA, or CuP are not preserved in Walasua , rendering difficult the comparison with Alexrasnitsynia ( Tan 1980). Nevertheless, the area between RA and RP is broad and with numerous crossveins in Alexrasnitsynia , unlike the situation in Walasua .

Alexrasnitsynia bears similar pattern of wing venation to monotypic Sypharoptera Handlirsch, 1911, based on Sypharoptera pneuma known from the Upper Carboniferous of Mazon Creek (USA). Handlirsch (1911) established a separate order Sypharopteroidea for it, which he thought represented an offshoot of Palaeodictyoptera , with possible relationship to Megasecoptera . Martynov (1938) considered this group an offshoot from Spilapteridae ( Palaeodictyoptera ) or their ancestors, but did not include it in the latter order. Further placement was done by Rohdendorf (1962) who assigned Sypharoptera to Diaphanopterodea on the basis of position of wings. Carpenter first provided revision considering position of Sypharoptera in Neoptera contra all previous authors, but resulting with placement to Insecta incertae sedis and later reconsidered as Palaeoptera incertae sedis ( Carpenter 1967, 1992). Finally Rasnitsyn (2002: 80) considered Sypharoptera to be possibly related to neopterous group Caloneurida on the basis of roof-like wing position, elongate wings with narrow costal space and simple and straight CuA and CuP. However, the holotype of Sypharoptera is not in a position that allows determining with accuracy that the wings were in a roof-like position in the living animal (Fig. 3), while the narrow costal space and simple, straight CuA and CuP can be found in many Diaphanopterodea and are not sufficient for an attribution to another clade.

Sypharoptera shares with Alexrasnitsynia rather short ScP, RA and RP widely separated and connected by a series of transversal crossveins, but the organisation of RP, MA, MP, and CuA at their bases is unknown in the former. So we cannot be sure of its possible affinities with our fossil. In particular, it is not possible to determine on the photograph of the holotype of Sypharoptera if it has a MA very closely parallel to radial stem and reaching the short oblique basal part of RP, fused with it for short distance, and separating again distally, as in Alexrasnitsynia .

The other structures of wing venation are similar in Sypharoptera and Alexrasnitsynia , with the main difference in the greater number of branches of RP in the latter (6-7 branches) than in the former (3-4 branches). One might be tempted to consider that Alexrasnitsynia and Sypharoptera belong to the same family of Diaphanopterodea . Nevertheless several important structures diagnostic to the family to which Alexrasnitsynia belongs are unknown in Sypharoptera , so we prefer to consider Alexrasnitsynia in a separate new family.