biology

Odontomachus spinifer

Odontomachus spinifer is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Odontomachus spinifer rather than just read about it. In short: Odontomachus spinifer is an extinct species of ant in the subfamily Ponerinae known from one possibly Miocene fossil found on Hispaniola. O. spinifer is one of two species in the ant genus Odontomachus to have been described from fossils found in Dominican amber and is one of a number of Odontomachus species found in the Greater Antilles.

Key takeaways

Odontomachus spinifer belongs to biology; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Odontomachus spinifer to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Odontomachus spinifer from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Odontomachus spinifer is an extinct species of ant in the subfamily Ponerinae known from one possibly Miocene fossil found on Hispaniola. O. spinifer is one of two species in the ant genus Odontomachus to have been described from fossils found in Dominican amber and is one of a number of Odontomachus species found in the Greater Antilles.

History and classification Odontomachus spinifer is known from a solitary fossil insect which, along with a microhymenopteran, is an inclusion in a transparent yellow chunk of Dominican amber. The amber was produced by the extinct Hymenaea protera, which formerly grew on Hispaniola, across northern South America, and up to southern Mexico. The specimen was collected from an undetermined amber mine in fossil-bearing rocks of the Cordillera Septentrional mountains of northern Dominican Republic. The amber dates from at least the Burdigalian stage of the Miocene, based on studying the associated fossil foraminifera, and may be as old as the Middle Eocene, based on the associated fossil coccoliths. This age range is due to the host rock being secondary deposits for the amber, and the Miocene as the age range is only the youngest that it might be. At the time of description, the holotype specimen, number "Do-2215", was preserved in the State Museum of Natural History Stuttgart amber collections in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The holotype fossil was first studied by entomologist Maria L. De Andrade of the University of Basle with her 1994 type description of the new species being published in the journal Stuttgarter Beiträge zur Naturkunde. Serie B (Geologie und Paläontologie). The specific epithet spinifer is derived from the Latin word which means "bearing a spine", a reference to the large projection on the top of the petiole.

Based on the head structure, O. spinifer was suggested to be part of the O. haematodus species group, closely placed with the species O. affinis, O. mayi, and O. panamensis. The three modern species are from Brazil and Guyana up through Panama and Costa Rica. The two modern species found on the island of Hispaniola, O. bauri and O. insularis are not closely placed to O. spinifer, having different structuring of the heads upper surface. When first described, O. spinifer was one of two Odontomachus species that had been described from fossils. It and Odontomachus pseudobauri were both described by De Andrade from Dominican amber in the same paper. A third species Odontomachus paleomyagra, the first compression fossil species, was described in 2014 from a worker found in Priabonian age lignite deposits of the Most Basin, Czech Republic.

Description The O. spinifer worker is approximately 11.08 mm (0.44 in) in length, and has a shining exoskeleton of yellowish red to reddish brown tones. The smooth exoskeleton has tiny punctuation found across the top of the head, mandibles, petiole node and the gaster. In contrast the frons, antennae depressions, pronotum, mesonotum and underside of the petiole are distinguished by varying degrees of striation. The head is large with a rectangular outline, being two-thirds longer than wide, with the rear margin of the head wider than the maximum width of the pronotum. The mandibles are almost as long as the head is wide and the chewing margin has twelve teeth increasing in size towards the tip, while the apex of each has three teeth, a preapical, intercalary, and an apical tooth. The antennae have notably long scapes that extend past the rear margin of the head capsule and curve slightly along their length. The first funicular segments of the antennae are double the length of the second segment and longer than any of the other 10 segments. The mesonotum and propodeum have an elongated slender profile, as does the petiole, while the gaster is bell shaped along the connection with the petiole and the sting is partially retracted. There is a notably large backward curving spine formed from the upper surface of the petiole, being longer than the width of the petiole.

References

External links Media related to Odontomachus spinifer at Wikimedia Commons

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Odontomachus spinifer

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Odontomachus spinifer claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Odontomachus spinifer before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Odontomachus spinifer ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Odontomachus spinifer

In research: Odontomachus spinifer appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Odontomachus spinifer in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Odontomachus spinifer is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Burdigalian life, Dominican amber, Fauna of Hispaniola, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Odontomachus spinifer outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Odontomachus spinifer in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Odontomachus spinifer means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Odontomachus spinifer out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Odontomachus spinifer in simple terms?

Why does Odontomachus spinifer matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Odontomachus spinifer?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Odontomachus spinifer.