Clavelinidae is a family of

tunicate Tunicates are marine invertebrates belonging to the subphylum Tunicata ( ). This grouping is part of the Chordata, a phylum which includes all animals with dorsal nerve cords and notochords (including vertebrates). The subphylum was at one time ...

s in the order

Aplousobranchia Aplousobranchia is an order of sea squirts in the class Ascidiacea, first described by Fernando Lahille in 1886. They are colonial animals, and are distinguished from other sea squirts by the presence of relatively simple pharyngeal baskets. Thi ...

Genera

WoRMS The World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) is a taxonomic database that aims to provide an authoritative and comprehensive catalogue and list of names of marine organisms. Content The content of the registry is edited and maintained by scien ...

recognizes the following genera in the family Clavelinidae: * '' Clavelina'' * '' Euclavella'' * ''

Nephtheis ''Nephtheis fascicularis'', commonly called the lollipop tunicate, lollipop coral, or blue palm coral, is a species of tunicate that is native to the shallow reefs of Indonesia. It is the only species in its genus ''Nephtheis''. They are not phot ...

'' * ''

Pycnoclavella ''Pycnoclavella '' is a genus of sea squirts first circumscribed by Walter Garstang in 1891. The generic name comes from the Ancient Greek (''puknós'') meaning "closely united". In 1990, Patricia Kott placed ''Pycnoclavella'' in its own famil ...

Phylogeny

''Pycnoclavella'' has occasionally been placed in a separate family,

Pycnoclavellidae Clavelinidae is a family of tunicates in the order Aplousobranchia. Genera , WoRMS recognizes the following genera in the family Clavelinidae: * ''Clavelina'' * ''Euclavella'' * ''Nephtheis'' * ''Pycnoclavella'' Phylogeny ''Pycnoclavell ...

, although

phylogenetic In biology, phylogenetics () is the study of the evolutionary history of life using observable characteristics of organisms (or genes), which is known as phylogenetic inference. It infers the relationship among organisms based on empirical dat ...

studies have recovered it as a relative of ''Clavelina''. In multiple analyses, the monotypic genus ''Nephtheis'' appears to branch from within ''Clavelina''.

References

Tunicate families Taxa named by Sylvanus Charles Thorp Hanley {{tunicata-stub