Camptostroma Temporal range: Early Cambrian
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Artist's reconstruction | |
Scientific classification | |
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Genus: | †Camptostroma
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Species: | †C. roddyi
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Binomial name | |
Camptostroma roddyi Hundt 1939
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Camptostroma roddyi is an extinct echinoderm from the Bonnia-Olenellus Zone the Early Cambrian Kinzers Formation near York and Lancaster, Southeastern Pennsylvania.[1] In life, it would have resembled a cupcake, with the axial skeleton forming a star pattern on the upper surface. It was originally thought, on the basis of its medusoid shape, to be a jellyfish-like organism, but the fossils themselves clearly rule out the possibility of a gelatinous body - the stereom plates are clearly preserved and possess the calcitic cleavage pattern diagnostic of echinoderms.[1] It has been placed in a class of basal echinoderms, the Edrioasteroids.[2][3]
Other species have been described from time to time, but all have since been reassigned to other genera - and often different phyla.[3]