Based on the estimation of its body mass and metabolic rate, we calculated heat balance, gas exchange, osmoregulation, and digestion of the 290-million-year-old aquatic amphibian Archegosaurus. Our results suggest that its physiology was more fish- than tetrapod-like in many respects. We conducted this study, which is mainly based on theoretical calculations and comparison with extant analogs, to shed light on the physiology and lifestyle of early tetrapods.

Based on a total of 14 inclusions from Burmese amber the new, extinct insect order Tarachoptera was established. The new order Tarachoptera is placed in the superorder Amphiesmenoptera. The species of Tarachoptera are tiny insects with a wing span of 2.3–4.5 mm, but are highly specialized according to their aberrant morphology. They lived in the forests of Southeast Asia about 100 million years ago.

A revision of amber fossils assigned to Cylindrocolea dimorpha has yielded evidence of the presence of underleaves, which have not previously been reported for this species and conflict with the current circumscription of the family. We transfer the fossil species to Odontoschisma and propose the new combination O. dimorpha. Our reclassification concurs with hypotheses on the divergence times of Cephaloziaceae derived from DNA sequence data.

The cephalopods Sepia (cuttlefish) from recent seas are well known, but what is their evolutionary history, when did they originate and how did they spread within the oceans? Based on a new sepiid record from Australia, we now recognize periods of sepiid migration, their evolution and distribution in time and space.

The ongoing technical revolution in non-destructive 3-D visualisation via micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) finds a valuable application in the studies of bioerosion trace fossils, since their three-dimensional architecture lies hidden within hard substrates. Selected examples of such cases are illustrated by reference to bioerosion trace fossils preserved in Late Cretaceous belemnite guards from the European Chalk Province, including the description of two new trace fossil ichnospecies.

DNA-based divergence time estimates suggested major changes in the composition of epiphyte lineages of liverworts during the Cretaceous; however, evidence from the fossil record is scarce. We present the first Cretaceous fossil of the liverwort genus Radula in ca. 100 Ma old Burmese amber. Our analyses support origins of most extant subgenera of Radula by the end of the Cretaceous and diversification of their crown groups in the Cenozoic.

We review the fossil history of pseudoscorpions (Arachnida: Pseudoscorpiones), one of the oldest terrestrial lineages with a fossil record that goes back to the Devonian. Pseudoscorpions do not fossilise easily, and records from the Mesozoic and Cenozoic consist almost exclusively of amber inclusions. Overall, 16 of the 26 recent families have been documented from fossils. This is a group of evolutionary stasis and we discuss aspects of palaeobiology, preservation, and ecology.

Amber functions as a window into the past, capable of capturing behaviors frozen for millions of years. Here, we report on the exceptionally rare discovery of a dinosaur-age larva of a stinging wasp, feeding on its cricket host, in mid-Cretaceous amber from Myanmar. It reveals a considerable constancy in the biology of this particular family over the last 100 million years. The excellent preservation of the larva is remarkable and due solely to the fidelity permitted by inclusion in amber.

A partial carapace of a turtle from the middle Eocene of Saint-Gilles is presented here. Although it was donated to the Institut royal des Sciences naturelles de Belgique (Brussels, Belgium) more than a century ago, it remained undescribed. Its study allows us to recognize the second pleurodiran turtle in the Belgian fossil record. It is the first partial articulate shell of a pleurodiran recognized in Belgium, and the only member of this clade recognized in this country at specific level.

A new fossil species relative of grasshoppers, crickets and katydids is described from the famous Xiaheyan locality (China). Compared to other species recovered from these 310-million-year-old strata, Sinogerarus pectinatus gen. and spec. nov. is likely most closely related to extant forms. The group it belongs to will become preeminent a few million years later but is very rare at Xiaheyan.

Extant pygmy and dwarf sperm whales (Kogia spp.) are known as small-sized and enigmatic relatives of the great sperm whale Physeter. Here we describe Koristocetus pescei, a new fossil kogiid from the late Miocene (ca 7 million years ago) of Peru. The description of this new form evokes a long history of morphological and ecological diversity in fossil kogiids, thus suggesting that our comprehension of the evolutionary history of diminutive sperm whales is still far from being exhaustive.

Plesiosaurians retain a very long neck but greatly reduce neck flexibility, and the cervicals have large, paired, and highly symmetrical foramina on the ventral side of the centrum, traditionally termed subcentral foramina, and on the floor of the neural canal. We found that these dorsal and the ventral foramina are connected by a canal. The foramen are not for nutrient transfer; they are the osteological correlates of a highly paedomorphic vascular system in the neck of plesiosaurs.