| Pakucaris Temporal range:
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Scientific classification 
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| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Arthropoda |
| Order: | †Hymenocarina |
| Genus: | †Pakucaris Izquierdo-López & Caron, 2021 |
| Species: | †P. apatis
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| Binomial name | |
| †Pakucaris apatis Izquierdo-López & Caron, 2021
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Pakucaris is an extinct genus of bivalved arthropod known from a single species, Pakucaris apatis, found in the Marble Canyon locality of the Burgess Shale in British Columbia, Canada. It is thought to be a member of Hymenocarina. Unlike other members of that group, the posterior segments are covered with a separate pygidium shield, covergent on other arthropods like artiopods. Specimens range in length from 11.65 to 26.6 millimetres (0.459 to 1.047 in). The main bivalved carapace covers around 80% of the body, with the pygidium covering the remaining 20%. The head has a forward and downward facing pair of moderately sized eyes on short stalks, along with three pairs of cephalic appendages. The thorax has either 30-35 or 70-80 segments, depending on the specimen, while the pygidium has either 11-13 or 20 segments. The segments of the thorax and pygidium have pairs of thin filamentous limbs divided into 20/21 podomeres, with paddle-like exopods. It was probably nektobenthic (actively swimming close to the seafloor), and its ecology was likely that of a selective suspension feeder, using its limbs to scrape and/or suspend food particles from the sea floor, before using its limbs to capture and transfer them to the mouth.[1]
References
- ^ Izquierdo‐López, Alejandro; Caron, Jean‐Bernard (November 2021). Zhang, Xi‐Guang (ed.). "A Burgess Shale mandibulate arthropod with a pygidium: a case of convergent evolution". Papers in Palaeontology. 7 (4): 1877–1894. doi:10.1002/spp2.1366. ISSN 2056-2799. S2CID 236284813.
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This page was last edited on 28 April 2023, at 09:27