Phylogenetic position of the extinct insect family Vetanthocoridae (Heteroptera) in Cimiciformes

Abstract

The extinct fossil family Vetanthocoridae, with the tribes Vetanthocorini and Crassicerini, was considered a member of the Cimicoidea. Because the tribe Vetanthocorini has been transferred to Nabidae, the systematic position of Vetanthocoridae is in doubt. Punctivetanthocoris pubens gen. et sp. nov. from the Early Cretaceous Yixian Formation of China is assigned to Vetanthocoridae. Based on the combination of fossil and extant taxa, two cladistic analyses were conducted to confirm the phylogenetic position of the fossil family Vetanthocoridae within Cimiciformes and Cimicoidea. The monophyly of Cimiciformes and Cimicoidea is supported. The fossil family Vetanthocoridae is included in Cimicoidea, and forms a monophyletic group with the extant flower bugs.

http://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:404279F9-D9F7-4871-A7C7-9839E62139BD

Keywords:

• Cimicomorpha
• Early Cretaceous
• Yixian Formation
• phylogeny

Acknowledgements

We express our gratitude to Yongjie Wang for valuable suggestions and for assistance with the phylogenetic analyses, and we are grateful to Zhang Weiting for the careful and critical comments on the manuscript. This research was funded by grants from the National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program; No. 2012CB821906); National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 31372242, 41272006, 31230065); Project of Outstanding Young-Aged Talents of the Beijing Municipal Commission of Education (CIT&TCD201304163), the General Program of Science and Technology Development Project of the Beijing Municipal Education Commission of China (KM201210028016), the Program for Changjiang Scholars and Innovative Research Team in University (IRT13081), and Project of Great Wall Scholar and KEY Project of Beijing Municipal Commission of Education Project (KZ201310028033).

Supplemental data

Supplemental material for this article can be accessed online at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14772019.2016.1219779.

Additional information

Funding

This work was National Natural Science Foundation of China [31230065, 41272006, No. 31372242]; the Program for Changjiang Scholars and Innovative Research Team in University [IRT13081]; Project of Outstanding Young-Aged Talents of the Beijing Municipal Commission of Education [CIT&TCD201304163]; the National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) [No. 2012CB821906]; the General Program of Science and Technology Development Project of the Beijing Municipal Education Commission of China [KM201210028016]; Project of Great Wall Scholar and KEY Project of Beijing Municipal Commission of Education Project [KZ201310028033]