Jurodidae


Jurodidae is a family of beetle that was originally described from a fossil species Jurodes ignoramus Ponomarenko, 1985. In 1996, a species Sikhotealinia zhiltzovae representing the only living representative of this family was discovered in the Sikhote-Alin mountains in Siberia. This "living fossil" is unique in having three ocelli on their forehead, a condition otherwise unknown in the entire order Coleoptera, whether extinct or living - though it is common in other orders, and generally considered a groundplan character for neopteran insects. Sikhotealinia and Jurodes are considered as a sister group to all other archostematan beetles.