Ceratomyrmex ellenbergeri , which displays a graceful horn on its head, is a new species of ant discovered by a group of Chinese scientists in collaboration with the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), according to an article recently published by Current magazine. Biology .
The group of paleontologists and geologists who have discovered this unicorn ant have identified it in four different fragments fossilized in amber from the Hukawng Valley, in Burma.
This insect lived 99 million years ago, during the Upper Cretaceous , the same in which the dinosaurs became extinct, and it had huge vertical jaws and a prominent frontal horn reminiscent of a unicorn.
It was less than 10 millimeters long and its morphology, with powerful trap-jaws that closed very quickly, suggests that they were predatory and that, although ants are social insects, they hunted alone. They used their horn as a decoy to attract and catch their prey, which used to be larger than them.
Its characteristic sickle-shaped jaw-trap is shared with a group of ants that exist today, those of the genus Odontomachus , although these are not an evolution of those; in fact, Ceratomyrmex ellenbergeri disappeared near the end of the Mesozoic era.
Image: Dinghua Yang
