An unexpected record of Moina Baird, 1850 (Crustacea: Cladocera) in Pleistocene deposits of North-Eastern Eurasia

We found several ephippia belonging to the genus Moina Baird, 1850 (Branchiopoda: Cladocera: Moinidae) in two Pleistocene paleo-sites located in the northern portion of Sakha (Yakutia) Republic, Eastern Siberia, Russia.Based on morphological data, we identified all inspected ephippia as Moina cf.macrocopa (Straus, 1820) due to presence of a specific sculpture: flattened cells at the ephippium perimeter and fine meshes on the egg chambers.In the Asian part of Russia, Central Yakutia is the north-easternmost region where moinids were found to date, but we here demonstrate that, during the Pleistocene, they occurred in more northern and eastern territories.Together with some other branchiopods, most moinids can be considered as a group associated with the arid shallow water bodies.This type of water bodies is completely absent in the northern Yakutia now.Therefore, our records of fossil Moina in northern Yakutia fit well with the earlier proposed concept of the existence of none-analogous communities of branchiopod crustaceans in North-Eastern Eurasia during the Late Pleistocene.