''Latouchella'' is an extinct

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

of marine

invertebrate Invertebrates are a paraphyletic group of animals that neither possess nor develop a vertebral column (commonly known as a ''backbone'' or ''spine''), derived from the notochord. This is a grouping including all animals apart from the chordate ...

animal, that is considered to be a

mollusk Mollusca is the second-largest phylum of invertebrate animals after the Arthropoda, the members of which are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized. The number of fossil species is e ...

and which may be a sea snail, a gastropod. It is a helcionellid from the

Tommotian Stage 2 of the Cambrian is the unnamed upper stage of the Terreneuvian Series. It lies atop the Fortunian and below Stage 3 of the Cambrian. It is commonly referred to as the Tommotian, after the Cambrian stratigraphy of Siberia. Neither the upp ...

epoch of what is now

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive region, geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a ...

. Its tightly coiled, spiral shell contains a number of low "walls" running up the front surface of the interior; these would have directed water currents within its shell. Between these walls are a series of furrows, parallel to the shell's aperture, giving casts of the internal structure the appearance of a railway line, with sleepers (created by furrows) tying together paired rails that run towards the apex of the shell.

Description

This genus had a curved, segmented shell, and it is often reconstructed as a

snail A snail is, in loose terms, a shelled gastropod. The name is most often applied to land snails, terrestrial pulmonate gastropod molluscs. However, the common name ''snail'' is also used for most of the members of the molluscan class G ...

-like creature.

Older taxonomy

The taxonomy of the genus ''Latouchella'' was originally like this: class Helcionelloida, order Helcionellida, superfamily Helcionelloidea, family Helcionellidae.

2005 taxonomy

The taxonomy of the Gastropoda by Bouchet & Rocroi, 2005Bouchet P. & Rocroi J.-P. (Ed.); Frýda J., Hausdorf B., Ponder W., Valdes A. & Warén A. 2005. ''Classification and nomenclator of gastropod families''. Malacologia: International Journal of Malacology, 47(1-2). ConchBooks: Hackenheim, Germany. . ISSN 0076-2997. 397 pp. http://www.vliz.be/Vmdcdata/imis2/ref.php?refid=78278 categorizes Latouchella in the family Coreospiridae in the superfamilia Scenelloidea within the Paleozoic molluscs of uncertain systematic position. ''Latouchella'' was a type genus in the family Latouchellidae Golikov & Starobogatov, 1989, however Latouchellidae is a synonym of Coreospiridae.

2006-2007 taxonomy

The 2006-2007 taxonomy of the genus ''Latouchella'' is like this: class Helcionelloida, subclass Archaeobranchia, order Helcionelliformes, superfamily Helcionelloidea, family Coreospiridae.

Species

Species in the genus ''Latouchella'' include: * '' Latouchella costata'' ( type) * ''L. accordionata'' * ''L. adelocosma'' * ''L. adunca'' * ''L. alicae'' * ''L. arcuata'' * ''L. arguta'' * ''L. burlingi'' * ''L. dimicostata'' * ''L. holmdalense'' * ''L. iacobinica'' * ''L. korobokovi'' * ''L. merino'' * ''L. ostenfeldense'' * ''L. pearylandica'' * ''L. pocatelloensis'' * ''L. sonlingpoensis'' * ''L. taijiangensis'' * ? '' Latouchella memorabilis'' Missarzhevsky in Rozanov et al., 1969 * ? '' Latouchella orientalis''

References

Notes

*Gubanov, Alexander P.; Peel, John S.. Redescription of the type species of Latouchella Cobbold, 1921 (Mollusca) from the Lower Cambrian of Comley, England. GFF 1998 03. *Gubanov, Alexander P.; Peel, John S.. Oelandiella, the earliest Cambrian helcionelloid mollusc from Siberia. Palaeontology April 1999. *Brock, Glenn A.. Middle Cambrian molluscs from the southern New England Fold Belt, New South Wales, Australia. Geobios 1998. *Runnegar, Bruce; Jell, Peter A.. Australian Middle Cambrian molluscs and their bearing on early molluscan evolution. Alcheringa: An Australasian Journal of Palaeontology 1976 01. * E.S. Cobbold. 1921. ''The Cambrian horizons of Comley (Shropshire) and their Brachiopoda, Pteropoda, Gasteropoda and etc''. Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London 76:325-386 Fossils of Russia Coreospiridae Cambrian molluscs Fossil taxa described in 1921 Paleozoic life of British Columbia Paleozoic life of Nova Scotia {{Cambrian-animal-stub