How the insect got its wings: Scientists (at last!) tell the tale

[Jim__]

From phys.org:

Insects incorporated two ancestral crustacean leg segments (labeled 7 in red and 8 in pink) into the body wall. The lobe on leg segment 8 later formed the wing in insects, while this corresponding structure in crustaceans forms the tergal plate. Credit: Heather Bruce
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Insect wings, the team confirmed, evolved from an outgrowth or "lobe" on the legs of an ancestral crustacean (yes, crustacean). After this marine animal had transitioned to land-dwelling about 300 million years ago, the leg segments closest to its body became incorporated into the body wall during embryonic development, perhaps to better support its weight on land. "The leg lobes then moved up onto the insect's back, and those later formed the wings," says Bruce.

One of the reasons it took a century to figure this out, Bruce says, is that it wasn't appreciated until about 2010 that insects are most closely related to crustaceans within the arthropod phylum, as revealed by genetic similarities.

"Prior to that, based on morphology, everyone had classified insects in the myriapod group, along with the millipedes and centipedes," Bruce says. "And if you look in myriapods for where insect wings came from, you won't find anything," she says. "So insect wings came to be thought of as 'novel' structures that sprang up in insects and had no corresponding structure in the ancestor—because researchers were looking in the wrong place for the insect ancestor."

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[Botany]

1. Flying Shrimp?

n/t

[hedda_foil]

3. Flying lobster!!!

[Botany]

5. No because the lobster stayed in the water and those front legs elvoved into claws instead of ...

... becoming wings which might be the case in terrestrial insects.

BTW if you have an extra nickle or two to give this season please think of the Xerces Society.
They do very important work.

[William Seger]

2. Too bad we don't have an extra pair of legs

... that could evolve into wings. That would be cool.