''Azteca eumeces'' is an

extinct Extinction is the termination of a kind of organism or of a group of kinds (taxon), usually a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and ...

species of ant in the subfamily Dolichoderinae known from possibly Miocene fossils found on

Hispaniola Hispaniola (, also ; es, La Española; Latin and french: Hispaniola; ht, Ispayola; tnq, Ayiti or Quisqueya) is an island in the Caribbean that is part of the Greater Antilles. Hispaniola is the most populous island in the West Indies, and th ...

. ''A. eumeces'' is one of only two species in the ant genus '' Azteca'' to have been described from fossils, both found in Dominican amber.

History and classification

When described ''Azteca eumeces'' was known from approximately thirty nine fossil insects which are solitary or group inclusions in transparent chunks of Dominican amber. The amber was produced by the extinct ''

Hymenaea protera ''Hymenaea protera'' is an extinct prehistoric leguminous tree, the probable ancestor of present-day ''Hymenaea'' species. Most neotropical ambers come from its fossilized resin, including the famous Dominican amber. ''H. protera'' once grew in ...

'', which formerly grew on

and across northern South America up to southern Mexico. The holotype specimen was collected from Palo Quemado, near Santiago, while the other six amber specimens are from unidentified amber mines in fossil-bearing rocks of the Cordillera Septentrional mountains, northern Dominican Republic. The amber dates from at least the Burdigalian stage of the Miocene, based on studies of the associated fossil foraminifera and may be as old as the Middle Eocene, based on the associated fossil coccoliths. This age range is due to the host rock being a secondary deposit for the amber, and the Miocene the age range is only the youngest that it might be. At the time of description, the holotype worker and the paratype worker, male and queen specimens were preserved in the Museum of Comparative Zoology amber collections. The fossils were first studied by entomologist Edward O. Wilson of the Harvard University with his 1985

type description A species description is a formal description of a newly discovered species, usually in the form of a scientific paper. Its purpose is to give a clear description of a new species of organism and explain how it differs from species that have ...

of the new species being published in the journal '' Psyche''. The

specific epithet In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

''eumeces'', derived from the Greek ''eumekes'', meaning "of good length". ''A. eumeces'' is one of two ''Azteca'' species described by Wilson from Dominican amber, the other species, '' A. alpha'' is one of the most numerous ant fossils in the amber.

Description

''Azteca eumeces'' has a suite traits that match modern species in the ''alfari'' group. ''A. alpha'' is separated from the other species in the group by the elongated shape of the head capsules. The species has an overall look that is similar to the living species '' A. bicolor'', '' A. fasciata'' and '' A. theresiae''. Those three species and the coeval species '' A. alpha'' are distinguished from ''A. eumeces'' in that all have workers with shorter head capsules.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q14438603 †eumeces Fossil ant taxa Burdigalian life Neogene Dominican Republic Miocene insects of North America Prehistoric insects of the Caribbean Fauna of Hispaniola Insects of the Dominican Republic Fossils of the Dominican Republic Dominican amber Fossil taxa described in 1985 Taxa named by E. O. Wilson