Kingdom Animalia Class Gastropoda Rank Family | Phylum Mollusca Superfamily Conoidea | |
Similar Borsoniidae, Raphitomidae, Mangeliidae, Pseudomelatomidae, Clavatulidae | ||
Mitromorphidae is a monophyletic family of small to medium-sized sea snails, marine gastropod mollusks in the superfamily Conoidea.
Contents
Bouchet, Kantor et al. elevated in 2011 the subfamily Mitromorphinae (which at that point had been placed in the family Conidae) to the rank of family. This was based on a cladistical analysis of shell morphology, radular characteristics, anatomical characters, and a dataset of molecular sequences of three gene fragments.
Description
The Mitromorphidae have small to medium-sized shells with a high biconic mitriform shape, a paucispiral or multispiral protoconch up to 4.5 whorls, a short or indistinct siphonal canal, narrow aperture with up to 3 columellar pleats, indistinct anal sinus on a weakly pronounced subsutural ramp, fairly smooth surface with spiral sculptural elements. There is no operculum, and the radula is relatively short, hypodermic in character with awl-shaped teeth, a swollen solid basal region, and may have a weak barb at the terminal end of the radular tooth.
Genera
This is a list of the accepted names of genera in the family Mitromorphidae (the main reference for recent species is the World Register of Marine Species).