100-million-year-old ant–conifer associates inside French amber: a fortuitous or ecological association?

Ants exhibit a plethora of ecological interactions with terrestrial plants. These interactions are broadly surveyed in modern ecosystems, but are much more difficult to unveil in the fossil record. Here, we report a unique ant–conifer association preserved in an opaque piece of 100-million-year-old amber from Charentes in Western France, revealed by propagation phase-contrast X-ray synchrotron microtomography (PPC-SRμCT). Most legs of the ant...