It is a great honor for us to undertake the 9th International Conference on Fossil Insects, Arthropods and Amber (FossilsX3 Conference) originally planned to be held in Xi’an, China in 2022 at the 8th FossilsX3 Conference in Dominican Republic in 2019. As the current COVID-19 pandemic has brought many uncertainties to international travel and activities, after consultation with the International Palaeoentomological Society (IPS), the meeting will be postponed for one year in Xi’an in 2023.

In the past year and a half, we have conducted two inspections on the venue and field routes of the conference. We originally planned to schedule the conference in mid-to-late April, 2022. However, due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, these investigations have not yet been able to determine the final venue and accommodating during the field trip, and we cannot estimate the specific costs for the time being. As promised at the Dominican Republic conference, we will provide economical conference fees and mid-conference field trip fees, as well as reasonable pre-conference filed trip fees. Payments can be made at the meeting.

Field Trips:

The field trips will cover the Mesozoic stratigraphy and palaeontology of the Ordos Basin and the Loess Plateau. The towering Qinling Mountains developed in the southern part of Xi’an. This investigation has entered the Loess Plateau from the Guanzhong Basin, where Xi’an is located, to the Tongchuan area, and the northernmost city of Yulin is a desert area. The purpose of the investigation is to understand the Mesozoic strata, palaeontology, palaeoclimate and tectonic movements in the Ordos Basin. From the dry hot environment of the Red Bed in the mid-Triassic, it experienced a large cycle of warm and humid environment and then to the dry climate of the Early Cretaceous. Specifically, the middle and lower parts of the Middle Triassic Zhifang Formation are red beds, and coal lines begin to appear in the upper part of the formation; the overlying Middle-Upper Triassic Yanchang Formation has extensive oil and gas resources, and the lower strata are called by some authors the Tongchuan Formation and yielded a large number of insect fossils. At the turn of the Triassic and Jurassic, the area was elevated and lacked sedimentation. The Fuxian Formation of coal-bearing strata developed in the Early Jurassic. In the Middle Jurassic, the Yan’an Formation was a set of coal-bearing strata, which developed the largest coal mine in China. The upper Jurassic Zhiluo Formation is a glutenite deposit with a purple-red upper part, marking the beginning of a new drought cycle. The unconformity between the Zhiluo Formation and the conglomerate at the bottom of the Lower Cretaceous Yijun Formation indicates the Yanshan Movement-Phase B.

The Yanshan Movement-Phase A is not evident in the Ordos Basin, but is obvious at the edge of the basin, which is equivalent to the interface between the Yan’an Formation and the underlying Fuxian Formation. Yanshan Movement-Phase B developed in this area, and the terrain was elevated in the Tongchuan area. The Zhiluo Formation and the Yijun Formation were in direct contact, and the Upper Jurassic-Lower Cretaceous Anding Formation and the Lower Cretaceous Fenfanghe Formation between the former two were invisible. The middle and lower parts of the Zhiluo Formation are variegated clastic rocks, and the upper part is a red rock layer, which represents the beginning of a regional arid climate. The Jurassic-Cretaceous boundary in the Ordos Basin is located in the upper part of the Anding Formation.