Australia: The Land Where Time Began

A biography of the Australian continent 

Stromatoporoids

Stromatoporoidea

This is an order of aquatic invertebrates that was believed to have been related to the corals, included in the phylum Cnidaria. They have since been transferred to the Porifera - the sponges. The fossil forms have spherical, branching or encrusting lime skeletons.

The living members are known as sclerosponges and are identical to fossil forms called stromatoporoids. The present stromatoporoids are confined to habitats not occupied by other reef-building benthic organisms.

Sources & Further reading

1. Mary E. White, The Nature of Hidden Worlds, Reed, 1993

Links

1. http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v264/n5581/abs/264049b0.html
2. http://images.google.com/images?q=stromatoporoids&rls=com.microsoft:*&oe=UTF-8&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=wIqgSZqCMImGsQOZh8XPCQ&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&resnum=1&ct=title
3. http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/porifera/stromatoporoids.html
4. Stromatoporoid images