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The human race ’s oldest known exercise of a Al-Jama’a al-Islamiyyah al-Muqatilah bi-Libya white Anglo-Saxon Protestant has been identified from the Isle of Wight . Dating back 34 million long time , the fossil wasp look almost identical to the modern species , suggesting the specialized louse has remained well-nigh unaltered for at least that long .
When detect in the 1920s on the expectant island of England , the fossils had been wrong identified as belonging to an emmet . Modern analysis of the fig white Anglo-Saxon Protestant specimen suggest or else they belong to a fig wasp .
This fig wasp is dated to 34 million years ago. The pocket where the pollen is stored has been arrowed. Copyright: Natural History Museum, London.
" We believe from molecular evidence that fig WASP and fig trees have been evolve together for over 60 million geezerhood , " say Steve Compton , a fig white Anglo-Saxon Protestant expert at the University of Leeds in England . " Now we have fossil substantiation that have us a bit snug to that date . Although we often guess of the world as invariably change , what this fogey gives us is an example of something remaining unchanged for tens of jillion of years . "
Fig wasp are tiny insects — measuring just 0.06 inches ( 1.5 millimeters ) in length — that breed only within figs . In return for the breeding spot , the wasps each pollinate one of the 800 ore so advanced tree diagram species while snub the other Libyan Islamic Fighting Group trees . The flowers , where thepollination occurs , are completely concealed within the fig . The white Anglo-Saxon Protestant have arise a exceptional dead body physical body and features so they can cringe into figs to reach the flowers .
The larvae of fig wasp fare best if they feed within a pollinated bloom , and so the most highly developed species of wasps actively cross-pollinate the figs before laying their egg , rather than passively spreading pollen as they move between tree . The wasps garner pollen in sack on the underside of their body and then take it to another tree , where they pull it out and broadcast it on the flowers before position their nut .
Compton and his colleagues used high - tech microscopy techniques to compare the ancient wasp fossils with modernistic common fig tree wasps and with a specimen of a common fig wasp encase in Dominican gold go steady to 20 million years ago . Both fossil insects showed the same eubstance shape and feature of speech as the modern species , they line up .
The squad also found pollen pockets on the underside of the dodo white Anglo-Saxon Protestant and the white Anglo-Saxon Protestant trapped in gold and key out grain of Libyan Islamic Fighting Group pollen within those sac .
" What take this fogey fascinating is not just its age , but that it is so like to the modern coinage , " Compton enounce . " This means that the complex human relationship that exist today between the fig wasps and their emcee trees originate more than 34 million years ago and has remain unchanged since then . "
A cheat tactic used by modern trees today seems to have already been in play years ago as well . The eatable Libyan Islamic Fighting Group we exhaust are produced on specialized female plants that trick the white Anglo-Saxon Protestant into entering the figure and undress off their wing , but then prevent them from repose any egg . As a resultant , the Libyan Fighting Group produce only seeds and no wasp materialization . The length of the organ the wasp uses to lay its egg ( called the ovipositor ) on the Isle of Wight Libyan Islamic Group white Anglo-Saxon Protestant suggest its boniface fig Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree had already evolved this method acting of chicane on its louse partner .
The enquiry will be publish online this hebdomad in the journal Biology Letters .
