Echinosphaerites
{{No footnotes|date=May 2024}}{{Short description|Extinct genus of marine invertebrates}}
{{Italic title}}
{{Taxobox
| fossil_range = Early - Middle Ordovician
| image = Echinosphaerites.JPG
| image_caption = Echinosphaerites aurantium from the Middle Ordovician of Estonia.
| regnum = Animalia
| phylum = Echinodermata
| subphylum = Crinozoa
| classis = Rhombifera
| genus=Echinosphaerites
| genus_authority =
| subdivision_ranks = Species
| subdivision =
}}
Echinosphaerites is a genus of rhombiferan cystoid echinoderms that lived in the Early to Middle Ordovician of North America and Europe (Bockelie, 1981).
Biology
Echinosphaerites had branched biserial brachioles which is rare for species belonging to the Class Rhombifera. Echinosphaerites had a skeletal meshwork like many other blastozoan echinoderms, with a fine outer mesh layer and an inner coarse mesh layer. During evolution the number and location of these brachioles, including the branching patterns, increased in the number of brachioles and complexity of the branching pattern. The exothecal pore structures increased in the complexity of patterns of tangential canals (Bockelie, 1981).
References
- Bockelie, J.F., 1981. Functional morphology and evolution of the cystoid Echinosphaerites. Lethaia 14: 189–202.
External links
- [https://paleobiodb.org/classic/basicTaxonInfo?taxon_no=30959 Echinosphaerites] in the Paleobiology Database
- [https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1502-3931.1981.tb01689.x Functional morphology and evolution of the cystoid Echinosphaerites] in the Wiley Online Library
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Category:Ordovician echinoderms of Europe
Category:Fossils of the Czech Republic
Category:Ordovician echinoderms of North America
Category:Early Ordovician first appearances
Category:Middle Ordovician extinctions
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