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Macroscenella (Mollusca) from the Middle Ordovician of Wisconsin—a reinterpretation and reassignment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 May 2016

Ellis L. Yochelson
Ellis L. Yochelson*
Affiliation:
Department of Paleobiology, National Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C. 20560 and United States Geological Survey (retired)
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Abstract

Description of two new specimens of Macroscenella superba (Billings) provides additional data on this rare, poorly known Paleozoic genus. Macroscenella was considered first to be a gastropod, then a monoplacophoran, and finally a coelenterate. Chondrophorine affinities for this form cannot be totally ruled out, but the new specimens increase the probability that it is a mollusk. If so, Macroscenella is more likely a patellacean gastropod than a member of any other group of the Mollusca, though evidence for placement within the Mollusca is equivocal; the interior of the specimens is not exposed and musculature is unknown. If the integument was a shell, it was thin.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Paleontology , Volume 68 , Issue 6 , November 1994 , pp. 1252 - 1256
Copyright
Copyright © The Paleontological Society 

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