6 articles
Euplectella
Euplectella, or Venus' flower basket (Euplectella aspergillum), a deep-sea glass sponge genus with a fused silica lattice skeleton that traps shrimp, acts as biological optical fiber, and dates to the Ordovician Anji Biota.
Glass sponge morphology and siliceous skeleton
Glass sponges, class Hexactinellida, are deep-water sponges defined by skeletons of opaline silica spicules built on the six-rayed hexactin, and by syncytial rather than cellular soft tissue.
Glass sponge physiology and reproduction
Glass sponges are deep-sea filter feeders whose syncytial bodies lack nerves and muscles; they arrest pumping electrically, grow 1 to 9 cm yearly, and live up to 500 years.
Hexactinellid
Hexactinellid (glass sponge, class Hexactinellida): marine sponge with six-rayed siliceous spicules, syncytial tissue, no mesohyl; deep-sea, 200 to over 6,000 m; oldest sponge group.
Hexasterophora
Hexasterophora (Schulze, 1886) is the larger subclass of glass sponges (Hexactinellida), defined by hexaster microscleres; sister to Amphidiscophora, with orders Lyssacinosida, Sceptrulophora, and Lychniscosida.
Venus' flower basket
Venus' flower basket (Euplectella aspergillum), a deep-sea glass sponge of Hexactinellida with a vase-shaped silica lattice skeleton that houses shrimp pairs for life and inspires biomimetic engineering lattices.