A hundred million years ago, a small beetle stepped into tree resin in what is now Myanmar and was held there, perfectly, until now. When paleontologists opened that amber, they found antennae of a complexity no living insect carries — and a light organ beside them — suggesting that the earliest firefly relatives did not choose between scent and glow, but wielded both at once. The fossil, named Icaroramus perisi, offers a rare glimpse into an evolutionary crossroads, a moment before nature forced its creatures to specialize, when the dark was still full of possibility.
100-million-year-old beetle reveals fireflies once hunted by smell, not flash
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