Science has long known that man has created far from all that he is used to today. It is especially surprising to know what “not all” refers to the sexual sphere. Thanks to a recent study of Chinese scientists, it became known that the missionary posture was at least 165 million years old, and it came into use not from people, but from ancient insects.
Small insects that lived on Earth millions of years ago, even in those ancient times, when they mated, they preferred to pose face to face, reports gazeta.ru. Such a conclusion was obtained as a result of a study conducted by Chinese scientists under the guidance of Shu Li from Beijing Pedagogical University (China).
After examining the fossil remains of many insects in the Inner Mongolia region in northeastern China, researchers found a rarity unusual for scientists - a couple of copulating insects that turned out to be penicus slobbery, or Anthoscytina perpetua bibs, feeding on the sap of plants and jumping from branch to branch. Scientists have found that the death overtook these insects at such an awkward moment as much as 165 million years ago.
As a result, the pennits were the oldest known to science living organisms, petrified during coitus. Before that, the two oldest flies, petrified during the "fertilization" 135 million years ago, were discovered on the territory of today's Lebanon. One of the co-authors of the study, Chongkun Shi, says: “This happens so rarely! I have worked on this topic since 1999 and have seen more than half a million fossil remains. ”
This study received the very touching title “Eternal love: the oldest discovery of copulating insects from the Middle Jurassic period” and was published in the journal PloS ONE. The authors of a scientific article told that for some time the samples obtained during the study had lain in the university collection for a long time, until scientists were interested in them.
In general, the value of such findings for science as a whole lies in the fact that samples of petrified animals help scientists to find out not only the structural features of their organisms, but also the specifics of their behavior, namely, sexual behavior. Today, entomological scientists know that insects living in our time use completely different poses and techniques in the process of mating, although the insect male is most often on top. “There is no limit to diversity,” says Marie Herberstein, a behavioral ecology specialist at Macquarie University in Sydney. - The theory of the evolution of the sexual behavior of insects investigated by scientists from different countries confirms that the current position “male from above” in insects was preceded by the position “female from above”. However, the same theory says that such a transition required an intermediate position - the abdomen to the abdomen (missionary). ”
Scientists also know that the same pennies are still resorted to this position, depending on the circumstances, i.e. being, for example, on a piece of paper, they have sex being sideways to each other, but having settled on a stalk, they spend this process looking at each other.
The absence of previously fossil samples from researchers has made this theory untenable. “It requires just such samples for its confirmation,” M. Herberstein believes. “The insect fossils in this place are so good that we can see in detail their structure, including the hairs,” explains Chongkun Shi.
After the discovery, after examining a pair of pennits under a microscope, scientists found that the insects actually mated before the onset of death: the male copulative organ of the male (edeagus) was inside the seminal receptacle of the female, and the 8th and 9th segments of the abdomen of the male were bent towards to the female. “We can see the male and female organs. This is truly a rarity, ”says Shi.
Scientists believe that the cause of the death of insects in such a "piquant" moment could well become a volcano, the eruption of which led to the release of poisonous gases that killed all living things nearby, including microbes and bacteria, without which the dead steam and petrified, not having time to decompose.
Thus, scientists have received another reason to reconsider the existing theory of the evolution of behavior of living organisms now living on Earth. “Think for yourself. There are more insect species on our planet than any other species. So, studying the sexual behavior of insects, we understand the behavior of most animals, ”said Herberstein.
The article is based on materials .
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