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Mollusca is a phylum of protostomic invertebrate animals, whose members are known as molluscs or mollusks [a] (/ ˈ m ɒ l ə s k s /). Around 76,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized, making it the second-largest animal phylum after Arthropoda . [ 5 ]
The mollusc (or mollusk [spelling 1]) shell is typically a calcareous exoskeleton which encloses, supports and protects the soft parts of an animal in the phylum Mollusca, which includes snails, clams, tusk shells, and several other classes. Not all shelled molluscs live in the sea; many live on the land and in freshwater.
In some mollusks the mantle cavity is a brood chamber, and in cephalopods and some bivalves such as scallops, it is a locomotory organ. The mantle is highly muscular. In cephalopods the contraction of the mantle is used to force water through a tubular siphon, the hyponome, and this propels the animal very rapidly through the water. In ...
Various parts of the exoskeleton may be fused together. [10]: 289 Each somite, or body segment can bear a pair of appendages: on the segments of the head, these include two pairs of antennae, the mandibles and maxillae; [5] the thoracic segments bear legs, which may be specialised as pereiopods (walking legs) and maxillipeds (feeding legs). [6]
The taxonomic term Bivalvia was first used by Linnaeus in the 10th edition of his Systema Naturae in 1758 to refer to animals having shells composed of two valves. [3] More recently, the class was known as Pelecypoda, meaning "axe-foot" (based on the shape of the foot of the animal when extended).
The outermost layer is the periostracum which is resistant to abrasion and provides most shell coloration. The body of the snail contacts the innermost smooth layer that may be composed of mother-of-pearl or shell nacre, a dense horizontally packed form of conchiolin, which is layered upon the periostracum as the snail grows. [citation needed]
Scaphopoda / s k æ ˈ f ɒ p ə d ə / (plural scaphopods / ˈ s k æ f ə p ɒ d z /, from Ancient Greek σκᾰ́φης skáphē "boat" and πούς poús "foot"), whose members are also known as tusk shells or tooth shells, are a class of shelled marine invertebrates belonging to the phylum Mollusca with worldwide distribution and are the only class of exclusively infaunal marine molluscs.
The number of gastropod species can be ascertained from estimates of the number of described species of Mollusca with accepted names: about 85,000 (minimum 50,000, maximum 120,000). [9] But an estimate of the total number of Mollusca, including undescribed species, is about 240,000 species. [10]