Radiolaria
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Description: Information on these organisms including their fossil record, classification, biology and life cycle with a number of images of individual species.
Radiolaria are holoplanktonic protozoa and form part of the zooplankton, they are non-motile (except when flagella-bearing reproductive swarmers are produced) but contain buoyancy enhancing structures; they may be solitary or colonial. Formally they belong to the Phyllum Protista, Subphylum Sarcodina, Class Actinopoda, Subclass Radiolaria. The sister Subclass Acantharia have skeletons composed of strontium sulphate which is easily dissolved in seawater and are not preserved in the fossil record. Within the Subclass Radiolaria there are two important super-orders. The Tripylea which includes the Phaedaria which have skeletons composed of hollow silica bars joined by organic material, which are not commonly preserved, and the Polycystina which form skeletons of pure opal and are therefore more resistant to dissolution in seawater and hence more commonly preserved in the fossil record. The Polycystina may be divided into two suborders the Spumellaria and the Nassellaria. They are wholly marine, the most relatively commonly preserved and therefore studied members of the formal Subclass Radiolaria. It must be remembered, however, that seawater is under saturated with respect to silica and the degree of preservation of Radiolaria depends on the robustness of the skeleton, depositional and burial conditions and diagenesis.
Size: 1337 chars
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| Page title: | Radiolaria |
| Keywords: | micropalaeontology, micropaleontology, micropal, microfossils, nannofossils, acritarchs, calcareous nannofossils, chitinozoa, conodonts, diatoms, dinoflagellates, dinocycsts, forams, foraminifera, ostracods, palynology, rads, radiolaria, spores, pollen |
| Description: | This teaching and learning web-site is intended as an introduction to micropalaeontology. Micropalaeontology is the study of microfossils (any fossil generally less than 1mm in size). This page covers radiolaria. |
| IP-address: | 144.82.111.20 |