Assimineidae

Assimineidae
Temporal range: Miocene–Recent[1]
Apertural view of a shell of Assiminea grayana
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Mollusca
Class: Gastropoda
(unranked): clade Caenogastropoda

clade Hypsogastropoda
clade Littorinimorpha

Superfamily: Rissooidea
Family: Assimineidae
H. Adams & A. Adams, 1856
Subfamilies

Assimineinae
Ekadantinae
Omphalotropidinae

Diversity[2]
About 20 freshwater species and numerous amphibious terrestrial/marine species

Assimineidae is a family of minute snails with an operculum, gastropod mollusks or micromollusks in the superfamily Rissoidae. Many of these very small snails live in intermediate habitats, being amphibious between saltwater and land; others live in freshwater.

Distribution

The distribution of the Assimineidae is worldwide.[1]

Ecology

Various species in this family occur in estuarine habitats, in salt marshes and in freshwater. Some are terrestrial or amphibious.

Description

The shell is small to medium large, more or less egg-conelike shaped.[1] The apertural margin is simple.[1] The operculum is in most cases horny.[1]

Species in this family are characterized by rudimentary cephalic tentacles, a trunklike snout, a foot with a groove and rudimentary to absent ctenidium (a comb-like respiratory apparatus).[3]

Taxonomy

The following three subfamilies were recognized in the taxonomy of Bouchet & Rocroi (2005):

Genera

Genera in the family Assimineidae include:[4][5][6]

subfamily Assimineinae

subfamily Ekadantinae

subfamily Omphalotropidinae

subfamily ?

incertae sedis

References

This article incorporates public domain text from the reference.[1]

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Family summary for Assimineidae". AnimalBase, last change 15-08-2006, accessed 4 August 2010.
  2. Strong E. E., Gargominy O., Ponder W. F. & Bouchet P. (2008). "Global Diversity of Gastropods (Gastropoda; Mollusca) in Freshwater". Hydrobiologia 595: 149-166. hdl:10088/7390 doi:10.1007/s10750-007-9012-6.
  3. Abbott, R.T. (1958). "The gastropod genus Assiminea in the Philippines". Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia. 110: 213–278.
  4. "Assimineidae". Integrated Taxonomic Information System.
  5. Ingentaconnect
  6. ZipCodeZoo Archived February 10, 2012, at the Wayback Machine.
  7. Rosenberg, G. (2012). Assimineidae incertae sedis vulgaris. Accessed through: World Register of Marine Species at http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=598622 on 2012-05-31

External links

Media related to Assimineidae at Wikimedia Commons

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 11/18/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.