Family OPHIOLEPIDIDAE

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Introduction

The arms of ophiolepidids are long and stout, fused laterally into the disc, and they bear short adpressed arm spines. The dorsal arm plates are fragmented or augmented by supplementary plates in several genera, and the disc is usually covered with thick plates. Tentacle pores are usually well developed throughout the arm and are protected by one to several scales. There is an unpaired, infradental papilla at the end of each jaw, and a series of oral papillae along the side of the jaw, although these can occasionally be fused. The second oral tentacle pore opens on the sides of the jaw inside the oral slit and is often not visible from the ventral side.

The Ophiolepididae were considered previously to be a subfamily of the Ophiuridae. The subfamily, Ophiurinae, was distinguished by the position of the second oral tentacle pore which opens superficially at the rear of the jaw. However, recent cladistic analyses suggest that the similarity between the two taxa is superficial and the Ophiolepididae is distinguishable at the infraordinal level from the Ophiuridae.

History of changes