species
A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...
of
sea snail
Sea snails are slow-moving marine (ocean), marine gastropod Mollusca, molluscs, usually with visible external shells, such as whelk or abalone. They share the Taxonomic classification, taxonomic class Gastropoda with slugs, which are distinguishe ...
, a marine
gastropod
Gastropods (), commonly known as slugs and snails, belong to a large Taxonomy (biology), taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda ().
This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, freshwater, and fro ...
mollusk
Mollusca is a phylum of protostomic invertebrate animals, whose members are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 76,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized, making it the second-largest animal phylum after Arthropoda. The ...
in the
family
Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...
Raphitomidae
Raphitomidae is a Family (biology), family of small to medium-sized sea snails, marine (ocean), marine gastropod mollusks in the superfamily Conoidea.Bouchet P. & Rocroi J.-P. (Ed.) (2005). "Classification and nomenclator of gastropod families" ...
.''Lusitanops gigasei'': image /ref> Its specific name derives from the paleontologist Paul Gigase, the collector of the fossil specimen designated as the
holotype
A holotype (Latin: ''holotypus'') is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of s ...
.
Description
The shape and size of ''Lusitanops gigasei'' suggests it was a mobile and active predator, capable of hunting and capturing other small marine
invertebrate
Invertebrates are animals that neither develop nor retain a vertebral column (commonly known as a ''spine'' or ''backbone''), which evolved from the notochord. It is a paraphyletic grouping including all animals excluding the chordata, chordate s ...
s. The pointed
spire
A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spire ...
of the shell may have helped it to penetrate sand and sediment to access
prey
Predation is a biological interaction in which one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not ki ...
buried in the
seafloor
The seabed (also known as the seafloor, sea floor, ocean floor, and ocean bottom) is the bottom of the ocean. All floors of the ocean are known as seabeds.
The structure of the seabed of the global ocean is governed by plate tectonics. Most of ...
. The shell's prominent
apex
The apex is the highest point of something. The word may also refer to:
Arts and media Fictional entities
* Apex (comics)
A-Bomb
Abomination
Absorbing Man
Abraxas
Abyss
Abyss is the name of two characters appearing in Ameri ...
may have been an adaptation providing extra strength and
structural
A structure is an arrangement and organization of interrelated elements in a material object or system, or the object or system so organized. Material structures include man-made objects such as buildings and machines and natural objects such as ...
support.
Its shell was thick and sturdy, suggesting that it may have been adapted to living in environments with strong
water current
A current in a fluid is the magnitude and direction of flow within each portion of that fluid, such as a liquid or a gas.
Types of fluid currents include:
* Air current
* Water current
** Current (hydrology), a current in a river or stream
** Oce ...
s and
turbulence
In fluid dynamics, turbulence or turbulent flow is fluid motion characterized by chaotic changes in pressure and flow velocity. It is in contrast to laminar flow, which occurs when a fluid flows in parallel layers with no disruption between ...
. It could reach a length of 6.1 mm, and a diameter of 1.9 mm.
''L. gigasei'' may be a species intermediate between ''
Lusitanops
''Lusitanops'' is a genus of sea snails, marine gastropod mollusks in the family (biology), family Raphitomidae.
Description
This genus is characterized by a reticulated Sculpture (mollusc), sculpture, a large, inflated body whorl, a short sipho ...
'' and ''
Xanthodaphne
''Xanthodaphne'' is a genus of sea snails, marine gastropod mollusks in the family Raphitomidae.
Species
Species within the genus ''Xanthodaphne'' include:
* '' Xanthodaphne agonia'' (Dall, 1890)
* '' Xanthodaphne alessandropaglii'' Nappo & Pagl ...
'', as it had a combination of characteristics of these two
genera
Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family as used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In binomial nomenclature, the genus name forms the first part of the binomial s ...
. The
extant
Extant or Least-concern species, least concern is the opposite of the word extinct. It may refer to:
* Extant hereditary titles
* Extant literature, surviving literature, such as ''Beowulf'', the oldest extant manuscript written in English
* Exta ...
Pliocene
The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch (geology), epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.33 to 2.58Kallo, Belgium; age range: 6 to 2.588 Ma.
The holotype ''L. gigasei'' specimen was collected from the Oorderen Member, a stratigraphic deposition in shallow water. Extant ''Lusitanops'' species are found in very deep water of , apart from the rarely encountered ''L. expansus'', whose specimens have been found at .