The insect was discovered when Richard Harrington, a scientist and vice-president of the Royal Entomological Society of London, won an auction on eBay for a fossilized specimen, later to discover it was an unknown species.
The insect itself is 3–4 millimetres (0.12–0.16 in) long and was encased in a piece of amber 40 to 50 million years ago.
The fossil was sent to Ole Heie, an aphid expert in Denmark,[1] who confirmed the insect a new species, now extinct.
Mindarus harringtoni is thought to have fed on a tree called Pinus succinifera, which itself is long extinct.
This Hemiptera article related to members of the insect suborder Sternorrhyncha is a stub.