The Palaeozoic sediments of the Barrandian area are globally well-known as a classic example of rocks characterised by an abundant skeletal marine fauna, including well-preserved remains of hyoliths. Several tens specimens of malformed invertebrates such as trilobites, cephalopods and gastropods have been collected and documented from Cambrian to Devonian clastic sediments and carbonates in this area. However, no malformed hyolith specimen has yet been recorded. Hyoliths are Palaeozoic animals with small calcium carbonate shells composed of the conch (= oblong, conical and bilaterally symmetrical shell of diverse cross section and aperture at its wide end) and the operculum (= cap closing the conch aperture). Here we describe an operculum showing regeneration after non-lethal predatory attack in the Ordovician hyolith Elegantilites custos. This is the first record of regeneration in a hyolith operculum that has been repaired after a failed durophagous attack. Epibenthic/infaunal predatory echinoderms, such as ophiuroids, are considered as potential culprits.
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The first healed injury in a hyolith operculum.
Naturwissenschaften
September 2023
Czech Geological Survey, Klárov 3, 1, 118 21, Prague 1, CZ, Czech Republic.
The Palaeozoic sediments of the Barrandian area are globally well-known as a classic example of rocks characterised by an abundant skeletal marine fauna, including well-preserved remains of hyoliths. Several tens specimens of malformed invertebrates such as trilobites, cephalopods and gastropods have been collected and documented from Cambrian to Devonian clastic sediments and carbonates in this area. However, no malformed hyolith specimen has yet been recorded.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA fresh look at the Hyolithid from the Early Cambrian (Stage 4) Shipai Formation of the Three Gorges Area, Hubei, South China.
Biology (Basel)
June 2022
State Key Laboratory of Continental Dynamics, Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Early Life and Environments, Department of Geology, Northwest University, Xi'an 710069, China.
New hyolith specimens from the early Cambrian (Stage 4) of the Three Gorges area, western Hubei Province are described and assigned to the species . are preserved in two taphonomic modes: casts in silty mudstone revealing gross morphology and some soft parts, and internal molds in calcareous pelites, which exhibit new morphological details of the conch and operculum. SEM and Micro-CT analyses show that preserve well-developed platy clavicles and cardinal processes on the interior of the operculum composed of rod-shaped tubular elements.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHyolithid-like hyoliths without helens from the early Cambrian of South China, and their implications for the evolution of hyoliths.
BMC Ecol Evol
May 2022
State Key Laboratory of Continental Dynamics, Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Early Life and Environments and Department of Geology, Northwest University, Xi'an, 710069, China.
Background: A small hyolith, with a triangular operculum and a conical-pyramidal conch with a sharp apex, originally documented as Ambrolinevitus ventricosus, is revised based on new material from the Chengjiang biota. The operculum of 'Ambrolinevitus' ventricosus displays strong morphological similarities with the operculum of Paramicrocornus from the Shuijingtuo Formation (Cambrian Series 2), indicating that the species should be reassigned to Paramicrocornus.
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Hyoliths are Palaeozoic lophophorates.
Nature
January 2017
Departments of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Earth Sciences, University of Toronto, 25 Willcocks Street, Toronto, Ontario M5S 3B2, Canada.
Hyoliths are abundant and globally distributed 'shelly' fossils that appear early in the Cambrian period and can be found throughout the 280 million year span of Palaeozoic strata. The ecological and evolutionary importance of this group has remained unresolved, largely because of their poorly constrained soft anatomy and idiosyncratic scleritome, which comprises an operculum, a conical shell and, in some taxa, a pair of lateral spines (helens). Since their first description over 175 years ago, hyoliths have most often been regarded as incertae sedis, related to molluscs or assigned to their own phylum.
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