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Fossil find brings new discovery
A PhD student has stumbled across an entirely new species of flying grasshopper from the time of the dinosaurs.
Sam Heads, a research student at the University of Portsmouth, was sent fossil specimens thought to be stick insects from two German museums.
But he knew instantly he was looking at an ancient relative of the modern grasshopper which lived 115 million years ago
He compared the fossil with other species of grasshopper, and realised it had never been discovered before.
And it is not the first time the 24-year-old has identified a new species of insect.
He said: 'I've lost count of the number of times I've identified new species. Every time I open a museum drawer I find something new.
'Discovery is by far one of the most satisfying aspects of doing science. It is very exciting.'
The flying grasshopper belonged to a family called Proscopiidae, and its role was to act like a stick – a possible reason for confusion over what the insects were.
It was about five centimetres long, had a short head and well-developed wings.
It is now extinct but it belonged to a family which survives and whose common names include jumping sticks, stick grasshoppers and horse-head grasshoppers.
This family of grasshopper is common in Central and South America but have no wings, no ears and do not 'sing'.
Sam has named the new insect Eoproscopia martilli, after his university mentor Dr Dave Martill, who teaches in the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences.
The student said this latest find was significant because it provided a window into the evolutionary history of the proscopiid grasshoppers.
'As is always the case with scientific discoveries this find has raised more questions than it has answered,' he said.
'In the early Cretaceous period when South America was attached to Africa, this grasshopper could easily have moved between what are now two continents yet no proscopiids live in Africa today and we don't know why.'
Sam's latest discovery is published in Palaeontology journal today.
sion.donovan@thenews.co.uk
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Wednesday 08 February 2012
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