The Meandrinidae are a
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 ...
of
stony corals. The name comes from the Greek, ''maiandros'' meaning "meandering", referring to the miniature, winding valleys found between the
corallite
A corallite is the skeletal cup, formed by an individual stony coral polyp, in which the polyp sits and into which it can retract. The cup is composed of aragonite, a crystalline form of calcium carbonate, and is secreted by the polyp. Corallit ...
s. Fossil corals in this family have been found dating back to the
Cretaceous
The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 143.1 to 66 mya (unit), million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era (geology), Era, as well as the longest. At around 77.1 million years, it is the ...
.
[Family Meandrinidae]
Classification of Scleractinian (Stony) Corals. Retrieved 2011-12-20.
Description
The Meandrinidae are
colonial corals and form part of the
reef- building community. They contain
zooxanthellae, microscopic algae
symbionts that provide them with energy. They occur in various different shapes, including massive, encrusting, columnar, and phaceloid (with tubular corallites united at the base). Although superficially resembling members of the family
Faviidae, the corallites of meandrinids have solid, nonporous walls and evenly spaced, solid septa. Most of the genera are found only in the Atlantic Ocean.
[
]
Genera
The World Register of Marine Species includes these 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 ...
in the family:[
*'' Dendrogyra''
*'' Dichocoenia''
*'' Eusmilia''
*'' Meandrina'' Lamarck, 1801
]
References
Scleractinia
Cnidarian families
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