Monoplacophoran
Monoplacophora , meaning "bearing one plate", is a polyphyletic superclass of molluscs with a cap-like shell inhabiting deep sea environments . Extant representatives were not recognized as such until 1952; previously they were known only from the fossil record, and were thought to have become extinct 375 million years ago. Although the shell of many monoplacophorans is limpet-like in shape, they are not gastropods, nor do they have any close relation to gastropods. Definition Discussion about monoplacophorans is made difficult by the slippery definition of the taxon; some authors take it to refer to all non-gastropod mollusks with a single shell, or all single-shelled mollusks with serially repeated units; whereas other workers restrict the definition to cap-shaped forms, excluding spiral and other shapes of shell. The inclusion of the gastropod-like Bellerophontoidea within the group is also contentious. One attempt to resolve this confusion was to separate out the predomina ...
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