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Updated: Jun 25, 2026

Dissection and Flat-mounting of the Threespine Stickleback Branchial Skeleton
Published on: May 7, 2016
A great-appendage arthropod with a radial mouth from the Lower Devonian Hunsruck Slate, Germany
Gabriele Kühl1, Derek E G Briggs, Jes Rust
1Division of Palaeontology, Steinmann Institute, University of Bonn, Nussallee 8, 53115 Bonn, Germany.
Abstract:
Great-appendage arthropods, characterized by a highly modified anterior limb, were previously unknown after the Middle Cambrian. One fossil from the Lower Devonian Hunsrück Slate, Germany, extends the stratigraphic range of these arthropods by approximately 100 million years. Schinderhannes bartelsi shows an unusual combination of anomalocaridid and euarthropod characters, including a highly specialized swimming appendage. A cladistic analysis indicates that the new taxon is basal to crown-group euarthropods and that the great-appendage arthropods are paraphyletic. This new fossil shows that features of the anomalocaridids, including the multisegmented raptorial appendage and circular plated mouth, persisted long after the initial radiation of the euarthropods.
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