HOME
*





Conulariida
Conulariida is a poorly understood fossil group that has possible affinity with the Cnidaria. Their exact position as a taxon of extinct medusozoan cnidarians is highly speculative. Members of the Conulariida are commonly referred to as conulariids and appear in the fossil record from the latest parts of the Ediacaran period up until the Triassic. Structure The conulariids are fossils preserved as shell-like structures made up of rows of calcium phosphate rods, resembling an ice-cream cone with fourfold symmetry, usually four prominently-grooved corners. New rods were added as the organism grew in length; the rod-based growth falsely gives the fossils a segmented appearance. Exceptional soft-part preservation has revealed that soft tentacles protruded from the wider end of the cone, and a holdfast from the pointed end attached the organisms to hard substrate. The prevailing reconstruction of the organism has it look superficially like a sea anemone sitting inside an angular, h ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Conulariid01
Conulariida is a poorly understood fossil group that has possible affinity with the Cnidaria. Their exact position as a taxon of extinct medusozoan cnidarians is highly speculative. Members of the Conulariida are commonly referred to as conulariids and appear in the fossil record from the latest parts of the Ediacaran period up until the Triassic. Structure The conulariids are fossils preserved as shell-like structures made up of rows of calcium phosphate rods, resembling an ice-cream cone with fourfold symmetry, usually four prominently-grooved corners. New rods were added as the organism grew in length; the rod-based growth falsely gives the fossils a segmented appearance. Exceptional soft-part preservation has revealed that soft tentacles protruded from the wider end of the cone, and a holdfast (biology), holdfast from the pointed end attached the organisms to hard substrate. The prevailing reconstruction of the organism has it look superficially like a sea anemone sitting ins ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Cnidaria
Cnidaria () is a phylum under kingdom Animalia containing over 11,000 species of aquatic animals found both in freshwater and marine environments, predominantly the latter. Their distinguishing feature is cnidocytes, specialized cells that they use mainly for capturing prey. Their bodies consist of mesoglea, a non-living jelly-like substance, sandwiched between two layers of epithelium that are mostly one cell thick. Cnidarians mostly have two basic body forms: swimming medusae and sessile polyps, both of which are radially symmetrical with mouths surrounded by tentacles that bear cnidocytes. Both forms have a single orifice and body cavity that are used for digestion and respiration. Many cnidarian species produce colonies that are single organisms composed of medusa-like or polyp-like zooids, or both (hence they are trimorphic). Cnidarians' activities are coordinated by a decentralized nerve net and simple receptors. Several free-swimming species of Cubozoa and Scyphozo ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Cnidaria
Cnidaria () is a phylum under kingdom Animalia containing over 11,000 species of aquatic animals found both in freshwater and marine environments, predominantly the latter. Their distinguishing feature is cnidocytes, specialized cells that they use mainly for capturing prey. Their bodies consist of mesoglea, a non-living jelly-like substance, sandwiched between two layers of epithelium that are mostly one cell thick. Cnidarians mostly have two basic body forms: swimming medusae and sessile polyps, both of which are radially symmetrical with mouths surrounded by tentacles that bear cnidocytes. Both forms have a single orifice and body cavity that are used for digestion and respiration. Many cnidarian species produce colonies that are single organisms composed of medusa-like or polyp-like zooids, or both (hence they are trimorphic). Cnidarians' activities are coordinated by a decentralized nerve net and simple receptors. Several free-swimming species of Cubozoa and Scyphozo ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Staurozoa
Staurozoa is a class of Medusozoa, jellyfishes and hydrozoans. It has one extant order: Stauromedusae (stalked jellyfishes) with a total of 50 known species. A fossil group called Conulariida has been proposed as a second order, although this is highly speculative. The extinct order is largely unknown and described as a possibly cnidarian clade of marine life with shell-like structures, the Conulariida. Staurozoans are small animals () that live in marine environments, usually attached to seaweeds, rocks, or gravel.Collins, A. G. (n.d.). Staurozoa. ''AccessScience''. doi:10.1036/1097-8542.652700 They have a large antitropical distribution, a majority found in boreal or polar, near-shore, and shallow waters. Few staurozoans are found in warmer tropical and subtropical water environments of the Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific Ocean basins, but most are known from the Northern Hemisphere. Over the years their number of species has increased, thus right now it is said to have an estima ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Ediacaran Biota
The Ediacaran (; formerly Vendian) biota is a Taxonomy (biology), taxonomic period classification that consists of all life forms that were present on Earth during the Ediacaran Period (). These were composed of enigmatic tubular and frond-shaped, mostly sessility (zoology), sessile, organisms. Trace fossils of these organisms have been found worldwide, and represent the earliest known complex multicellular organisms. The Ediacaran biota may have undergone evolutionary radiation in a proposed event called the Avalon explosion, . This was after the Earth had thawed from the Cryogenian period's Snowball Earth, extensive glaciation. This biota largely disappeared with the rapid increase in biodiversity known as the Cambrian explosion. Most of the currently existing body plans of animals first appeared in the fossil, fossil record of the Cambrian rather than the Ediacaran. For macroorganisms, the Cambrian biota appears to have almost completely replaced the organisms that dominate ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Trilobozoa
''Trilobozoa'' (meaning "three-lobed animals") is a phylum of extinct mobile animals that were originally classified into the Cnidaria. The basic body plan of ''Trilobozoa'' is often a tri-radial or radial sphere-shaped form with lobes radiating from its centre. Fossils of trilobozoans are restricted to marine strata of the Late Ediacaran period. History and interpretations Originally, both Fedonkin and Runnegar presumed that there were 2-3 families within the Trilobozoa, those families being Albumaresidae Fedonkin, 1985 and Tribrachididae Runnegar, 1992. Although, affinities with the Conulariida were made because of the conulariids possessing similar three-fold symmetry. Mikhail Fedonkin later classified the Trilobozoa as a class of the Phylum Coelenterata. Most of the members of what is now the modern day classification for Trilobozoa were thought to have originally been free swimming Jellyfish. Tribrachidium was once interpreted as a Edrioasteroid Echinoderm, although wi ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Trilobozoa
''Trilobozoa'' (meaning "three-lobed animals") is a phylum of extinct mobile animals that were originally classified into the Cnidaria. The basic body plan of ''Trilobozoa'' is often a tri-radial or radial sphere-shaped form with lobes radiating from its centre. Fossils of trilobozoans are restricted to marine strata of the Late Ediacaran period. History and interpretations Originally, both Fedonkin and Runnegar presumed that there were 2-3 families within the Trilobozoa, those families being Albumaresidae Fedonkin, 1985 and Tribrachididae Runnegar, 1992. Although, affinities with the Conulariida were made because of the conulariids possessing similar three-fold symmetry. Mikhail Fedonkin later classified the Trilobozoa as a class of the Phylum Coelenterata. Most of the members of what is now the modern day classification for Trilobozoa were thought to have originally been free swimming Jellyfish. Tribrachidium was once interpreted as a Edrioasteroid Echinoderm, although wi ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Mississippian (geology)
The Mississippian ( , also known as Lower Carboniferous or Early Carboniferous) is a subperiod in the geologic timescale or a subsystem of the geologic record. It is the earlier of two subperiods of the Carboniferous period lasting from roughly 358.9 to 323.2 million years ago. As with most other geochronologic units, the rock beds that define the Mississippian are well identified, but the exact start and end dates are uncertain by a few million years. The Mississippian is so named because rocks with this age are exposed in the Mississippi Valley. The Mississippian was a period of marine transgression in the Northern Hemisphere: the sea level was so high that only the Fennoscandian Shield and the Laurentian Shield were dry land. The cratons were surrounded by extensive delta systems and lagoons, and carbonate sedimentation on the surrounding continental platforms, covered by shallow seas. In North America, where the interval consists primarily of marine limestones, it is treate ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




Anoxic Sea Water
Anoxic waters are areas of sea water, fresh water, or groundwater that are depleted of dissolved oxygen. The US Geological Survey defines anoxic groundwater as those with dissolved oxygen concentration of less than 0.5 milligrams per litre. Anoxic waters can be contrasted with Hypoxia (environmental), hypoxic waters, which are low (but not lacking) in dissolved oxygen. This condition is generally found in areas that have restricted water exchange. In most cases, oxygen is prevented from reaching the deeper levels by a physical barrier, as well as by a pronounced density stratification, in which, for instance, heavier hypersaline waters rest at the bottom of a basin. Anoxic conditions will occur if the rate of redox, oxidation of organic matter by bacteria is greater than the supply of dissolved oxygen. Anoxic waters are a natural phenomenon, and have occurred throughout geological history. The Permian–Triassic extinction event, a mass extinction of species from the world's oce ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Plankton
Plankton are the diverse collection of organisms found in Hydrosphere, water (or atmosphere, air) that are unable to propel themselves against a Ocean current, current (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 whales. Marine plankton include bacteria, archaea, algae, protozoa and drifting or floating animals that inhabit the saltwater of oceans and the brackish waters of estuaries. Freshwater plankton are similar to marine plankton, but are found in the freshwaters of lakes and rivers. Plankton are usually thought of as inhabiting water, but there are also airborne versions, the aeroplankton, that live part of their lives drifting in the atmosphere. These include plant spores, pollen and wind-scattered seeds, as well as microorganisms swept into the air from terrestrial dust storms and oceanic plankton swept into the air ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Anthozoa
Anthozoa is a subphylum of marine invertebrates which includes the sea anemones, Scleractinia, stony corals and Alcyonacea, soft corals. Adult anthozoans are almost all attached to the seabed, while their larvae can disperse as part of the plankton. The basic unit of the adult is the polyp (zoology), polyp; this consists of a cylindrical column topped by a disc with a central mouth surrounded by tentacles. Sea anemones are mostly solitary, but the majority of corals are Colony (biology), colonial, being formed by the budding of new polyps from an original, founding individual. Colonies are strengthened by calcium carbonate and other materials and take various massive, plate-like, bushy or leafy forms. Anthozoa is included within the phylum Cnidaria, which also includes the jellyfish, Box jellyfish, box jellies and parasitic Myxozoa and Polypodiozoa. The two main subclasses of Anthozoa are the Hexacorallia, members of which have six-fold symmetry in biology, symmetry and includes ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Scyphozoa
The Scyphozoa are an exclusively marine class of the phylum Cnidaria, referred to as the true jellyfish (or "true jellies"). The class name Scyphozoa comes from the Greek word ''skyphos'' (), denoting a kind of drinking cup and alluding to the cup shape of the organism. Scyphozoans have existed from the earliest Cambrian to the present. Biology Most species of Scyphozoa have two life-history phases, including the planktonic medusa or polyp form, which is most evident in the warm summer months, and an inconspicuous, but longer-lived, bottom-dwelling polyp, which seasonally gives rise to new medusae. Most of the large, often colorful, and conspicuous jellyfish found in coastal waters throughout the world are Scyphozoa. They typically range from in diameter, but the largest species, ''Cyanea capillata'' can reach across. Scyphomedusae are found throughout the world's oceans, from the surface to great depths; no Scyphozoa occur in freshwater (or on land). As medusae, they eat a ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]