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Fossilized fleas in amber are exceptionally rare, with only a handful of specimens discovered to date. All of these have been referred to modern groups still alive today, including (initially), a remarkable specimen in Dominican amber with unique features that warrant new tribal status. These properties are five-segmented maxillary palps and a pair of cerci-like organs positioned on tergite-X near the tip of the abdomen. The new species Atopopsyllus cionus was described by Dr. George Poinar, Jr., an entomologist from Oregon State University who published his findings in the latest edition of the Journal of Medical Entomology. Atopopsyllus cionus in Miocene...

Every three years the International Society of Arachnology (ISA) organizes a large international conference (the next one is in USA, 2016), with regional (Europe, USA, etc.) meetings being hosted by local societies and held in each of the intervening two years. The next (30th) European meeting will be held in the UK and hosted by Dr Sara Goodacre and colleagues at the University of Nottingham in 2017, as confirmed at the recent European Society of Arachnology conference just held in the Czech Republic. There is no website as yet, but one will be made available in due course and a...

Scientists have just published new research that will shake up our understanding of the progress of human evolution and even pose new questions about our identity. The team has called this new species of human relative "Homo naledi," and they say it appears to have buried its dead -- a behavior scientists previously thought was limited to humans. Standing at the entrance to the cave where the fossils were found, Lee Berger (lead author on the paper) said: "We have just encountered another species that perhaps thought about its own mortality, and went to great risk and effort to dispose...

Congratulations to Eva Liznarova (Czech Republic) and Luka Katusic (Italy) who received Siri Scientific Press book tokens as prize winners for their presentations at the 29th European Congress of Arachnology, held in Brno, Czech Republic, which included 173 participants from all over the world (42 different countries). Eva's talk was titled: Is prey-capture efficiency innate or gained by experience in a specialised spider? Kuka's talk was titled: An overview on the Croatian spider fauna. Congratulations to both! Anybody interested in learning more about the cutting edge of spider research, presented at such meetings, should take a look at our edited...

A new genus of British dinosaur has just been formally erected for Polacanthus rudgwickensis described by William T Blows in 1996. The specimen consists of one nearly complete dorsal vertebra, a dorsal vertebral centrum, an anterior caudal vertebra, fragments of other vertebrae, the proximal end of the left scapula with a fused coracoid fragment, a distal end of a humerus, a nearly complete right tibia, rib fragments, two dermal bones and many small fragments. Dorsal vertebra of the new genus in posterior, lateral and anterior views The new genus, Horshamosaurus Blows, 2015 is formally erected, justified and diagnosed, along with...