''Megapharanaspis nedini'' is a small (maximally )

trilobite Trilobites (; meaning "three lobes") are extinct marine arthropods that form the class Trilobita. Trilobites form one of the earliest-known groups of arthropods. The first appearance of trilobites in the fossil record defines the base of the At ...

of the superfamily

Emuelloidea Emuelloidae are a small superfamily of trilobites, a group of extinct marine arthropods, that lived during the late Lower Cambrian (late Botomian) of the East Gondwana supercontinent In geology, a supercontinent is the assembly of most or all ...

, within which it occupies a family on its own. Its fossils have been found in the

Lower Cambrian The Cambrian Period ( ; sometimes symbolized Ꞓ) was the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, and of the Phanerozoic Eon. The Cambrian lasted 53.4 million years from the end of the preceding Ediacaran Period 538.8 million years ago (m ...

of South-Australia.

Etymology

The genus name composed of the

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

μέγας (mega), meaning ''great'', pharangos, meaning gully, and ἀσπίς (aspis) shield, referencing Big Gully on

Kangaroo Island Kangaroo Island, also known as Karta Pintingga (literally 'Island of the Dead' in the language of the Kaurna people), is Australia's third-largest island, after Tasmania and Melville Island. It lies in the state of South Australia, southwest ...

, the only known site where fossils of ''Megapharanaspis'' were collected. The species

epithet An epithet (, ), also byname, is a descriptive term (word or phrase) known for accompanying or occurring in place of a name and having entered common usage. It has various shades of meaning when applied to seemingly real or fictitious people, di ...

''nedini'' is in honor of Dr. Chris Nedin.

References

Cambrian trilobites of Australia Emuelloidea Redlichiida genera {{Redlichiida-stub Cambrian genus extinctions