''Neanaperiallus'' 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 ...

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispec ...

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

of parasitic wasp in the Eupelmidae subfamily Neanastatinae containing only a single species, ''Neanaperiallus masneri''. The genus is solely known from the

Early Eocene In the geologic timescale the Ypresian is the oldest age or lowest stratigraphic stage of the Eocene. It spans the time between , is preceded by the Thanetian Age (part of the Paleocene) and is followed by the Eocene Lutetian Age. The Ypresian i ...

Baltic amber The Baltic region is home to the largest known deposit of amber, called Baltic amber or succinite. It was produced sometime during the Eocene epoch, but exactly when is controversial. It has been estimated that these forests created more than 1 ...

deposits in the

Baltic Sea The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden and the North and Central European Plain. The sea stretches from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from ...

region of Europe.

History and classification

''Neanaperiallus masneri'' is known only from one fossil, the

holotype A holotype is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism, known to have been used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of several ...

, number "AMNH B-JWJ-265", which is a single female specimen preserved in a nearly round

amber Amber is fossilized tree resin that has been appreciated for its color and natural beauty since Neolithic times. Much valued from antiquity to the present as a gemstone, amber is made into a variety of decorative objects."Amber" (2004). In Ma ...

block shaped with five unequal sides. The block is currently residing in the

American Museum of Natural History The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. In Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 26 inter ...

paleoentomology The most recent understanding of the evolution of insects is based on studies of the following branches of science: molecular biology, insect morphology, paleontology, insect taxonomy, evolution, embryology, bioinformatics and scientific computing ...

collections in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, USA. ''N. masneri'' was first studied by Gary A. P. Gibson, with his 2009

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 be ...

being published in the journal ''

ZooKeys ''ZooKeys'' is a peer-reviewed open access scientific journal covering zoological taxonomy, phylogeny, and biogeography. It was established in 2008 and the editor-in-chief is Terry Erwin (Smithsonian Institution). It is published by Pensoft Publ ...

''. The

generic Generic or generics may refer to: In business * Generic term, a common name used for a range or class of similar things not protected by trademark * Generic brand, a brand for a product that does not have an associated brand or trademark, other ...

name was coined by Gary Gibson as a combination of the

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

word ''periallos'', meaning "before all others", and from "neana" from the subfamily name Neanastatinae. This is in reference to the possible relationship of ''Neanaperiallus'' to the other genera in Neanastatinae. The specific epithet "''masneri''" was designated by Gary Gibson in honor of Lubomír Masner in recognition of his many contributions to the study of parasitic wasps.

Description

''Neanaperiallus masneri'' is in length when the

ovipositor The ovipositor is a tube-like organ used by some animals, especially insects, for the laying of eggs. In insects, an ovipositor consists of a maximum of three pairs of appendages. The details and morphology of the ovipositor vary, but typical ...

is included. The general coloration is a yellow tone, but it is possible the species may have in fact been a uniform brown based on clear views of the acropleuron and several of the abdomen tergites. Much of the female is obscured, with a coating of white mold covering the entire right side of the specimen. Much of the face is obscured by a large air bubble and numerous tiny bubbles reduce the clarity of the amber. Though the

forewing Insect wings are adult outgrowths of the insect exoskeleton that enable insects to fly. They are found on the second and third thoracic segments (the mesothorax and metathorax), and the two pairs are often referred to as the forewings and hindwin ...

s are uniformly hyaline in coloration the right wing still obscures the top of much of the gaster and metanotum. Basally the forewings are setose whereas the costal cell is setose along the front edge only. Beyond the parastigma the setae grow sparse and the wing apex is apparently bare. The mesosoma is short and stocky in comparison to the other genera which are placed in the Neanastatinae subfamily and many member genera of Eupelmidae overall. Similarly ''N. masneri'' has notably short antennae and middle legs. In general dorsal appearance the genus is very similar to males of the subfamily Eupelminae and the family

Pteromalidae The Pteromalidae are a very large family of mostly parasitoid wasps, with some 3,450 described species in about 640 genera (the number was greater, but many species and genera have been reduced by synonymy in recent years). The subfamily-level d ...

. Gary Gibson notes that many features of the species are not describable from the single known specimen, and that more complete specimens are needed to fully describe the species. Because of the shape and short length of the ovipositor sheath Gibson postulates that ''Neanaperiallus masneri'' was parasitic on hosts which were exposed or near the surface of wood or other substrates.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q6984269 Eocene insects Prehistoric life of Europe Fossil taxa described in 2009 Hymenoptera of Europe † Prehistoric Hymenoptera genera Baltic amber