Earliest-known fossil mosquito suggests males were bloodsuckers too

已知最早的蚊子化石表明，雄性蚊子也是吸血动物。

In a groundbreaking study reported in Current Biology, researchers have found the earliest-known fossil mosquitoes in Lebanese amber¹, revealing that ancient male mosquitoes likely fed on blood.

在《当代生物学》上发表的一项开创性研究中，研究人员在黎巴嫩琥珀中发现了已知最早的蚊子化石，揭示了古代雄性蚊子可能以血液为食。

That's noteworthy because, among modern-day mosquitoes, only females are hematophagous, meaning that they use piercing mouthparts to feed on the blood of people and other animals.

这是值得注意的，因为在现代蚊子中，只有雌性是吸血的，这意味着它们使用穿孔的口器来吸食人类和其他动物的血液。

This finding from the Lower Cretaceous period sheds new light on the evolution of mosquitoes and their relationship with flowering plants.

这一来自下白垩纪时期的发现为蚊子的进化及其与开花植物的关系提供了新的线索。

Lebanese amber is, to date, the oldest amber with intensive biological inclusions, and it is a very important material as its formation is contemporaneous with the appearance and beginning of radiation of flowering plants, with all that follows of co-evolution between pollinators and flowering plants”.

“黎巴嫩琥珀是迄今为止最古老的含有大量生物内含物的琥珀，它是一种非常重要的材料，因为它的形成与开花植物的出现和开始辐射是同时发生的，以及授粉昆虫和开花植物之间的共同进化。”