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Blastoid
Blastoids (class Blastoidea) are an extinct type of stemmed echinoderm, often referred to as sea buds. They first appear, along with many other echinoderm classes, in the Ordovician period, and reached their greatest diversity in the Mississippian subperiod of the Carboniferous period. However, blastoids may have originated in the Cambrian. Blastoids persisted until their extinction at the end of Permian, about 250 million years ago. Although never as diverse as their contemporary relatives, the crinoids, blastoids are common fossils, especially in many Mississippian-age rocks. Description Like most echinoderms, blastoids were protected by a set of interlocking plates of calcium carbonate, which formed the main body, or ''theca''. In life, the theca of a typical blastoid was attached to a stalk or column made up of stacked disc-shaped plates. The other end of the column was attached to the ocean floor by a holdfast, very much like stalked crinoids. The stalk was usually relat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Echinoderm
An echinoderm () is any animal of the phylum Echinodermata (), which includes starfish, brittle stars, sea urchins, sand dollars and sea cucumbers, as well as the sessile sea lilies or "stone lilies". While bilaterally symmetrical as larvae, as adults echinoderms are recognisable by their usually five-pointed radial symmetry (pentamerous symmetry), and are found on the sea bed at every ocean depth from the intertidal zone to the abyssal zone. The phylum contains about 7,600 living species, making it the second-largest group of deuterostomes after the chordates, as well as the largest marine-only phylum. The first definitive echinoderms appeared near the start of the Cambrian. Echinoderms are important both ecologically and geologically. Ecologically, there are few other groupings so abundant in the deep sea, as well as shallower oceans. Most echinoderms are able to reproduce asexually and regenerate tissue, organs and limbs; in some cases, they can undergo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cystoids
Cystoidea was defined as a class (biology), class of extinct paleozoic blastozoan echinoderms established to encompass stalked taxa that were neither crinoids nor blastoids. It was shown to be polyphyletic in the late 1960s but continues to be used even in recent (as of 2022) literature to discuss both rhombiferans and diploporitans. History The concept of Cystoidea has a complex history, with many emendations from its original conception. Early versions included the homalozoans, eocrinoids, paracrinoids, blastoids, and edrioblastoids. By 1967 the modern usage encompassing only rhombiferans and diploporitans had been established, although questions remained regarding the possible inclusion of blastoids. Despite these removals, speculation continued as to whether cystoids were ancestral to blastoids, crinoids, or echinoids. Work published in 1967 and 1968 questioned whether Cystoidea formed a natural group, and in 1972 the former orders Rhombifera and Diploporita were elevated ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pentremites
''Pentremites'' is an extinct genus of blastoid echinoderm belonging to the family Pentremitidae. Description These stalked echinoderms averaged a height of about but occasionally ranged up to about 3 times that size. They, like other blastoids, superficially resemble their distant relatives, the crinoids or ''sea lilies'', having a near-identical, planktivorous lifestyle living on the sea floor attached by a stalk. As with all other blastoids, species of ''Pentremites'' trapped food floating in the currents by means of tentacle-like appendages. ''Pentremites'' species lived in the early to middle Carboniferous, from 360.7 to 314.6 Ma. Its fossils are known from North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri .... References * ''Fossils'' (Smithsonian Handbooks) ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crinoid
Crinoids are marine invertebrates that make up the class Crinoidea. Crinoids that remain attached to the sea floor by a stalk in their adult form are commonly called sea lilies, while the unstalked forms, called feather stars or comatulids, are members of the largest crinoid order, Comatulida. Crinoids are echinoderms in the phylum Echinodermata, which also includes the starfish, brittle stars, sea urchins and sea cucumbers. They live in both shallow water and in depths of over . Adult crinoids are characterised by having the mouth located on the upper surface. This is surrounded by feeding arms, and is linked to a U-shaped gut, with the anus being located on the oral disc near the mouth. Although the basic echinoderm pattern of fivefold symmetry can be recognised, in most crinoids the five arms are subdivided into ten or more. These have feathery pinnules and are spread wide to gather planktonic particles from the water. At some stage in their lives, most crinoids have a sho ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Blastozoa
Blastozoa is a subphylum of extinct echinoderms characterized by the presence of specialized respiratory structures and brachiole plates used for feeding. It ranged from the Cambrian to the Permian. Biserial, triradiate, and pentaradiate ambulacral patterns have been identified in blastozoa specimens. The pentaradiate pattern in particular has been associated with several different classes. A significant species has been found at the Zaouïa Formation. References External linksHarvard: Subphylum Blastozoa Blastozoa, Paleozoic echinoderms Cambrian echinoderms Silurian echinoderms Ordovician echinoderms Devonian echinoderms Permian echinoderms Animal subphyla {{paleo-echinoderm-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carboniferous
The Carboniferous ( ) is a Geologic time scale, geologic period and System (stratigraphy), system of the Paleozoic era (geology), era that spans 60 million years, from the end of the Devonian Period Ma (million years ago) to the beginning of the Permian Period, Ma. It is the fifth and penultimate period of the Paleozoic era and the fifth period of the Phanerozoic eon (geology), eon. In North America, the Carboniferous is often treated as two separate geological periods, the earlier Mississippian (geology), Mississippian and the later Pennsylvanian (geology), Pennsylvanian. The name ''Carboniferous'' means "coal-bearing", from the Latin ("coal") and ("bear, carry"), and refers to the many coal beds formed globally during that time. The first of the modern "system" names, it was coined by geologists William Conybeare (geologist), William Conybeare and William Phillips (geologist), William Phillips in 1822, based on a study of the British rock succession. Carboniferous is the per ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Spiraculata
Spiraculata is an order of Blastoids. These blastoids are characterized by indirect entrance to the hydrospires through canals by way of pores. Genera *'' Acentrotremites'' *'' Ambolostoma'' *'' Arcuoblastus'' *'' Auloblastus'' *'' Belocrinus'' *'' Calycoblastus'' *'' Carpenteroblastus'' *'' Conuloblastus'' *'' Cordyloblastus'' *'' Costatoblastus'' *'' Cribroblastus'' *'' Cryptoblastus'' *'' Decemoblastus'' *'' Deliablastus'' *'' Deltoblastus'' *'' Dentiblastus'' *'' Devonoblastus,'' *'' Diploblastus'' *'' Doryblastus'' *'' Elaeacrinus'' *'' Eleutherocrinus'' *'' Ellipticoblastus'' *'' Euryoblastus'' *'' Globoblastus'' *'' Gongyloblastus'' *'' Granatocrinus'' *'' Heteroblastus'' *'' Houiblastus'' *'' Iranoblastus'' *'' Kadiskoblastus'' *'' Lophoblastus'' *'' Malchiblastus'' *'' Metablastus'' *'' Monadoblastus'' *'' Monoblastus'' *'' Monoschizablastus'' *'' Montanablastus'' *'' Nodoblastus'' *'' Nucleocrinus'' *'' Orbiblastus'' *'' Orbitremites'' *'' Pentephyllum'' *''Pentremites ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Plankton
Plankton are the diverse collection of organisms that drift in Hydrosphere, water (or atmosphere, air) but are unable to actively propel themselves against ocean current, currents (or wind). The individual organisms constituting plankton are called plankters. In the ocean, they provide a crucial source of food to many small and large aquatic organisms, such as bivalves, fish, and baleen whales. Marine plankton include bacteria, archaea, algae, protozoa, microscopic fungi, and drifting or floating animals that inhabit the saltwater of oceans and the brackish waters of estuaries. fresh water, Freshwater plankton are similar to marine plankton, but are found in lakes and rivers. Mostly, plankton just drift where currents take them, though some, like jellyfish, swim slowly but not fast enough to generally overcome the influence of currents. Although plankton are usually thought of as inhabiting water, there are also airborne versions that live part of their lives drifting in the at ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Continental Shelf
A continental shelf is a portion of a continent that is submerged under an area of relatively shallow water, known as a shelf sea. Much of these shelves were exposed by drops in sea level during glacial periods. The shelf surrounding an island is known as an "''insular shelf''." The continental margin, between the continental shelf and the abyssal plain, comprises a steep continental slope, surrounded by the flatter continental rise, in which sediment from the continent above cascades down the slope and accumulates as a pile of sediment at the base of the slope. Extending as far as 500 km (310 mi) from the slope, it consists of thick sediments deposited by turbidity currents from the shelf and slope. The continental rise's gradient is intermediate between the gradients of the slope and the shelf. Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the name continental shelf was given a legal definition as the stretch of the seabed adjacent to the shores ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ordovician
The Ordovician ( ) is a geologic period and System (geology), system, the second of six periods of the Paleozoic Era (geology), Era, and the second of twelve periods of the Phanerozoic Eon (geology), Eon. The Ordovician spans 41.6 million years from the end of the Cambrian Period Megaannum, Ma (million years ago) to the start of the Silurian Period Ma. The Ordovician, named after the Celtic Britons, Welsh tribe of the Ordovices, was defined by Charles Lapworth in 1879 to resolve a dispute between followers of Adam Sedgwick and Roderick Murchison, who were placing the same Rock (geology), rock beds in North Wales in the Cambrian and Silurian systems, respectively. Lapworth recognized that the fossil fauna in the disputed Stratum, strata were different from those of either the Cambrian or the Silurian systems, and placed them in a system of their own. The Ordovician received international approval in 1960 (forty years after Lapworth's death), when it was adopted as an official per ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
