National Natural Science Foundation of China
Xixia County was first excavated for fossils by a Geological Team of the Henan Geological Bureau in 1974. Fossils continued to be excavated there, but were not extensively studied until 1994 when Fang "et al." received funding from the National Natural Science Foundation of China. Under this sponsorship, with support of the Geological Profession Foundation and the Geological Science Item Foundation of MGMR, a multidisciplinary team of Chinese paleontologists took on the task of analyzing the geology and paleontology of these eggs. In 1998, Fang "et al." described numerous new ootaxa, including the oospecies ""Paraspheroolithus" shizuiwanensis".