Murchisonioidea
Encyclopedia
Murchisonioidea is an extinct superfamily
Family (biology)
In biological classification, family is* a taxonomic rank. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, genus, and species, with family fitting between order and genus. As for the other well-known ranks, there is the option of an immediately lower rank, indicated by the...

 of small to large sea snail
Snail
Snail is a common name applied to most of the members of the molluscan class Gastropoda that have coiled shells in the adult stage. When the word is used in its most general sense, it includes sea snails, land snails and freshwater snails. The word snail without any qualifier is however more often...

s, marine
Marine (ocean)
Marine is an umbrella term. As an adjective it is usually applicable to things relating to the sea or ocean, such as marine biology, marine ecology and marine geology...

 gastropod mollusks in the clade Vetigastropoda
Vetigastropoda
Vetigastropoda is a major taxonomic group of sea snails, marine gastropod mollusks that form a very ancient lineage. Taxonomically Vetigastropoda are sometimes treated as an order although they are a clade in Bouchet and Rocroi, 2005....

.

This superfamily was previously included in the Caenogastropoda
Caenogastropoda
Caenogastropoda is a taxonomic clade of a large diverse group of mostly marine gastropods.Caenogastropoda contains a majority of the families of shelled marine molluscs including such families as the periwinkles, cowries, wentletraps, moon snails, and cone snails.About 60% of all living gastropods...

 by Ponder
Winston Ponder
Winston F. Ponder B.Sc, M.Sc, Ph.D, D.Sc. is a noted malacologist from New Zealand who has named and described many marine animals, especially micromolluscs. He is a graduate of the University of Auckland, New Zealand....

 and Warén (1988) and by Bandel in studies published in 1993 and 1997. However, studies by Tracey et al. (1993) and by Frýda and Manda (1997) put them into the Archaeogastropoda. This has been confirmed by new findings on archaeopod-type protoconch
Protoconch
A protoconch is an embryonic or larval shell of some classes of molluscs, e.g., the initial chamber of an ammonite or the larval shell of a gastropod...

s in species from this families, dating from the early Devonian
Devonian
The Devonian is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic Era spanning from the end of the Silurian Period, about 416.0 ± 2.8 Mya , to the beginning of the Carboniferous Period, about 359.2 ± 2.5 Mya...

.

Taxonomy

  • † family Murchisoniidae
    Murchisoniidae
    Murchisoniidae is an extinct family of fossil gastropods in the superfamily Murchisonioidea .This family has no subfamilies.- Genera :Genera within the family Murchisoniidae include:...

     Koken, 1896
  • † family Cheeneetnukiidae
    Cheeneetnukiidae
    † Cheeneetnukiidae is an extinct family of sea snails, marine gastropod mollusks in the clade Vetigastropoda .This family has no subfamilies.- Genera :...

     Blodgett & Cook, 2002
  • † family Hormotomidae
    Hormotomidae
    † Hormotomidae is an extinct family of gastropods in the clade Vetigastropoda .This family has no subfamilies....

    Wenz, 1938


(Families that are exclusively fossil are indicated with a dagger †)
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