Giant dragonflies of meganeuvre: why they existed in antiquity and became extinct

Modern insects cannot boast of large sizes, and the word "insect" and its derivatives are synonymous with something small and defenseless. But this was far from always the case, because in past geological epochs such huge insects lived on our planet that it is even hard to imagine them.

Meganeuvers are the largest insects that have ever lived on our planet. Outwardly, they very much resembled modern dragonflies with a wingspan of up to 65-100 centimeters. Giant insects from the genus Meganeuver reached their peak about 300 million years ago during the Carboniferous period, although they appeared on the planet at the beginning of the Paleozoic. Carboniferous in general is characterized by the presence of a large number of large insects that thrived in a warm and humid climate. In that distant era, amphibians and large insects reigned on Earth, and primitive reptiles - the ancestors of giant dinosaurs, had just formed as a separate class of animals.

For the first time, the fossil remains of a mega-maneuver were found in France in 1880. According to paleontologists, meganeuvres, both adult individuals and their larvae, were predators and fed on other smaller insects. But why in the Carboniferous period did giant dragonflies and millipedes flourish, and in subsequent epochs did their extinction and the appearance of related species, but more modest in size, be noted?

Scientists were able to find out that the body size of insects breathing with the help of trachea is related to the level of oxygen in the atmosphere. During the Carboniferous period, conditions arose on the planet due to which a large number of coal deposits formed from plant debris were formed. These huge volumes of biomass were derived from decomposition processes, which, accordingly, did not require oxygen in the air. As a result of the reduction in the cost of oxidation in the atmosphere, a higher oxygen content was observed compared to previous periods.

This feature, according to some experts, could serve as the reason that very large insects lived in the Carboniferous and used trachea for breathing, including mega-maneuvers. Further on the Earth, another period with an increased oxygen content was observed, by that time birds had already appeared in the air, which did not allow the flying insect to develop to such a gigantic size.

Despite the fact that modern insects have greatly decreased in size, and the largest of them can easily fit in the palm of your hand, representatives of this class can still be called the most prosperous on the planet. Today, science knows more than 1 million species of insects, but, according to experts, there are much more of them - from 2 to 6 million, and entomologists are simply not able to describe and study them all.

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