Rajendra Singh Rana

Extinct plant fossils play a crucial role in testing hypotheses about the origins of angiosperms. Here, we report an extinct winged fruit species from the early Eocene sedimentary sequence (~55–52Ma) of the Gurha opencast lignite mine, Rajasthan, western India. A detailed macromorphological analysis and comparative study of both living and fossil angiosperms featuring five‐winged fruits support their recognition as a distinct taxon. The combination of major morphological characters (five enlarged narrowly obovate woody sepals/wings with three‐trace venation radiating from a central region, and a semi‐inferior ovary) of the recovered early Eocene winged fruits does not conform precisely to any known fossil or extant winged fruit. Therefore, we establish a new fossil genus and species, named Pentasepalous gurhaensis A. Ali & M. A. Khan gen. et sp. nov. This discovery offers significant new insights into the diversity of extinct angiosperms in the Indian subcontinent and highlights India's role as a key region for early angiosperm evolution.

The present 3D dataset contains 3D models of new material from the middle Eocene of the Upper Subathu Formation in the Kalakot area (India), documenting the anterior dentition of the raoellid Indohyus indirae. Raoellidae are closely related to stem cetaceans and bring crucial information to understand the earliest phase of land to water transition in Cetacea.

A single elmid larva reported from a laminate maroon shale bed of Gurha opencast lignite mine (Palana Formation, early Eocene, Bikaner District, north-western Rajasthan, India: Kumar et al., 2016) is the first preimaginal fossil known up to date. It was thoroughly examined and published by Kirejtshuk et al. (2023). However, because of the absence of any unambiguous diagnostic character for a strict generic attribution of this fossil, its rather described larva remained unnamed. Taking into consideration the scientific importance of this fact for different aspects of our knowledge it is rather advisable to introduce the description of this specimen to scientific community with a concrete specific name and probable generic attribution.

The aquatic bug family Aphelocheiridae currently comprises only the extant genus Aphelocheirus Westwood, 1833, with two subgenera, the nominal one and Micraphelocheirus Hoberlandt & Štys, 1979. The genus is widely distributed in Europe, Asia, Africa, but seems to be absent from the New World (Schuh & Weirauch, 2020). These small predatory insects live at the bottom of lakes and ponds, and breath thanks to highly specialized abdominal respiratory ‘rosettes’ characteristic of this family (Thorpe & Crisp, 1947a, b; Schuh & Slater, 1995). The closely related Naucoridae have to breathe at the surface of the water. Ye et al., 2020: fig. 4) proposed a late Triassic age for the Naucoroidea and separation between the Naucoridae and the Aphelocheiridae, but Wang et al. (2021: fig. 4) proposed that the (Potamocoridae + Aphelocheiridae) separated from the Naucoridae during the Jurassic and that the Aphelocheiridae could be early Cretaceous. The accurate aphelocheirid fossil record is very scarce, with the oldest known representative from the Eocene (Bartonian) of Germany (Moraweck et al., 2015); and a second fossil from the Pliocene of Germany (Popov, 2007; Kunzmann et al., 2017).

A single elmid larva is reported from a laminate maroon shale bed of Gurha opencast lignite mine (Palana Formation, early Eocene, Bikaner District, north-western Rajasthan, India). It is the first fossil larva that can be attributed to Elmidae with certainty. A generic assignation is not possible, because the larva is strongly compressed, and the most important characters are not visible or poorly preserved. The larva is described morphologically and illustrated by photographs and line drawings. A larva of a holometabolous insect from Baltic amber, which was published recently as a member of Elmidae by Zippel et al. (2022), possesses no structural characters that would clearly suggest placement in this family. A photograph of the hitherto unknown larva of the extant Grouvellinus rioloides from Kyrgyzstan is included for comparison.