Rare fossil amphipods from the Neogene of Shanxi, China

1. Rare fossil amphipods from
the Neogene of Shanxi, China
Denis Audo*, Diying Huang and Thomas Hegna

2. Introduction:
fossil & modern amphipods
Modern amphipods
• Laterally flattened,
generally 1 to 10 mm long
• 10 000 species
• Worldwide distribution
• In marine water, fresh water, soil
& caves
Map: CC-BY Daniel R. Strebe, 2011,
modified
Fossil amphipods
• 31 species (including open nomenclature)
• Broad northern hemisphere distribution
• Dating Early-Cretaceous to subfossil
• New specimens from the
Neogene of Shanxi, China

3. Material & methods 1/2
• 162 slabs of rock, about 646 specimens
• Most subcomplete, plus numerous fragments
10 mm

4. Problem
• fossil as a thin transparent
sheet: difficult to see
↑ Same specimen ↑
Solution
• Using light reflected on the
fossil by having the light
source very close to the
microscope lens.
Material & methods 2/2

5. Results & discussion
• Single known fossil amphipod described in China, 2nd in East Asia.
• Well-preserved, but almost no visible generic diagnostic characters
• Solution: using a group name for genus
(used as a genus, but not implying monophyly)
Gammaroidorum yooling (from the chinese 幽灵, meaning ghost)
Wei Y.-F., Dong A.-G., Huang D.-Y., Du Y.-W., Hegna T.A., Lian X.-N. & Audo D. 2021 Amphipoda from the Late
Neogene of Shanxi, China. Palaeoentomology, 4 (1), 85-93.
https://doi.org/10.11646/palaeoentomology.4.1.13
5 mm
5 mm