Investigation of fossils in lower Eocene Fushun amber from China keeps proving to be of major importance for understanding Eocene Euro-Asian insect diversity and distribution. Three new species of predatory biting midges in the fossil genera Mantohelea and Gedanohelea are described. Mantohelea sinica n. sp., Gedanohelea fushunensis n. sp. and Gedanohelea liaoningensis n. sp. from Eocene Fushun ...

The extinct Lithornithidae include several genera and species of flying palaeognathous birds of controversial affinities known from the Early Paleogene of North America and Europe. An almost complete, articulated skeleton from the Early Eocene marine deposits of the Fur Formation (Denmark) was recently assigned to Lithornis vulturinus Owen, 1840. This study provides a detailed redescription and...

A pair of fossilized imprints of feet represent the first published galliform (landfowl) specimen from the Lower Eocene Fur Formation of northwest Denmark. The specimen is referable to Galliformes due to the presence of a distinctly asymmetric trochlea metatarsi III. The specimen appears distinct from previously described Eocene Galliformes (e.g. Gallinuloididae, Quercymegapodiidae and Paraorty...

Paleoclimate studies suggest that increased global warmth during the Eocene epoch was greatly amplified at high latitudes, a state that climate models cannot fully reproduce. However, proxy estimates of Eocene near-Antarctic sea surface temperatures (SSTs) have produced widely divergent results at similar latitudes, with SSTs above 20 °C in the southwest Pacific contrasting with SSTs between 5 ...

We describe a set of early Eocene (∼ 55 Ma) climate model boundary conditions constructed in a selfconsistent reference frame and incorporating recent data and methodologies. Given the growing need for uniform experimental design within the Eocene climate modelling community and the challenges faced in simulating the prominent features of Eocene climate, we make publicly available our data sets...

Invertebrate lineages tend to originate and become extinct at a higher rate in onshore than in offshore habitats over long temporal durations (more than 10 Myr), but it remains unclear whether this pattern scales down to durations of stages (less than 5 Myr) or even sequences (less than 0.5 Myr). We assess whether onshore-offshore gradients in long-term turnover between the tropical Eocene and ...

Eocene climate and associated biotic patterns provide an analog system to understand their modern interactions. The relationship between mean annual temperatures and winter temperatures-temperature seasonality-may be an important factor in this dynamic. Fossils of frost-intolerant palms imply low Eocene temperature seasonality into high latitudes, constraining average winter temperatures there ...

Continuity is important for tracing evolutionary lineages through geological time. Modern Odontoceti and Mysticeti can be traced backward in time to Eocene Archaeoceti, and before them to mesonychian Condylarthra. Within this shared continuum, the origin of Archaeoceti and the origin of Cetacea is marked by the first indication of a derived evolutionary transition-in-grade from terrestrial to a...

[1] Past climates, such as the Eocene (55 38 Ma), experienced dramatically warmer polar winters. Global climate models run with Eocene-like boundary conditions have under-predicted polar temperatures, a discrepancy which has stimulated a recent hypothesis that polar stratospheric clouds may have been important. We propose that such clouds form in response to higher CO2 via changes in stratosphe...

Insect damage on fossil leaves from the Central Rocky Mountains, United States, documents the response of herbivores to changing regional climates and vegetation during the late Paleocene (humid, warm temperate to subtropical, predominantly deciduous), early Eocene (humid subtropical, mixed deciduous and evergreen), and middle Eocene (seasonally dry, subtropical, mixed deciduous and thick-leave...