Molaria
| Molaria Temporal range:
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|---|---|
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| Molaria spinifera in dorsal and lateral views from a plate in Walcott, 1912 | |
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| Molaria spinifera life restoration | |
Scientific classification 
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| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Arthropoda |
| (unranked): | †Artiopoda |
| Genus: | †Molaria Walcott, 1912 [1] |
| Type species | |
| Molaria spinifera Walcott, 1912
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| Other species | |
|
Molaria steini Peel, 2017 | |
2.jpg)
Molaria is a genus of
Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale. 144 specimens of Molaria are known from the Greater Phyllopod bed, where they comprise 0.27% of the community.[2] A second species M. steini was described from the Sirius Passet in Greenland in 2017.[3]
The body of Molaria consisted of a head shield (
tergites), and a telson, which included a short ventral spine and a long posterior spine. Three pairs of legs were beneath the cephalon and another eight pairs were attached to the trunk. Eyes were lacking, but a pair of short antennae was present on the cephalon. Specimens of Molaria ranged from 8 to 26 mm in length from cephalon to telson, with the posterior spine slightly longer than the body length.[4] Molaria was superficially similar to Habelia, another Burgess Shale arthropod with a long tail spine, but which possessed 12 trunk tergites.[4] It is currently considered a member of Artiopoda.[3]
The genus name derives from "Molar", the name of a mountain peak east of the
Alberta, Canada.[1]
References
- ^ a b Walcott, C. D. (1912). "Middle Cambrian Branchiopoda, Malacostraca, Trilobita and Merostomata". Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections. 57: 145–228.
- S2CID 53646959.
- ^ ISSN 1802-8225.
- ^ .
External links
- "Molaria spinifera". Burgess Shale Fossil Gallery. Virtual Museum of Canada. 2011. Archived from the original on 2020-11-12.