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Palaeophysiology of terrestrialisation in the Chelicerata

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 November 2011

Paul A. Selden  and
Andrew J. Jeram
Paul A. Selden
Affiliation:
Department of Extra-Mural Studies, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, U.K.
Andrew J. Jeram
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, U.K.
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Abstract

The wide range of organs of respiration (book-gills, book-lungs, sieve- and tube-tracheae), reproduction, sensory perception, etc., among the chelicerates indicates that the major groups made the transition to land life independently. The fossil record is patchy for most chelicerate groups, certain intervals (e.g. Westphalian) being particularly rich in chelicerate bearing Lagerstatten while in others (e.g. Mesozoic) they are sparse. Due, apparently, to their unusual hyaline exocuticle, scorpions are better preserved than other arthropods, and show a fairly continuous record from fully aquatic forms in the Silurian, to both aquatic and terrestrial faunas in the Carboniferous. In particular, new and well-preserved material of the earliest demonstrably terrestrial scorpions from the Lower Carboniferous of East Kirkton, West Lothian, suggests that book-lungs, at least in the scorpions, developed directly from book-gills by suturing of the covering plate (Blattfuss of the related eurypterids) to leave stigmata for diffusion of air. This evidence supports the ideas of early authors that the scorpion mesosomal ‘sternites’ are fused plates, contra Kjellesvig-Waering (1986) who envisaged the plates being lost to reveal true sternites beneath. The fossil evidence also indicates that by the Triassic at least two scorpion lineages had evolved intra-‘sternite’ stigmata.

Keywords

ArachnidaarthropodautecologycuticlePalaeozoicrespiration
Type
Physiological adaptations in some recent and fossil organisms
Information
Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of The Royal Society of Edinburgh , Volume 80 , Issue 3-4: Environments and Physiology of Fossil Organisms , 1989 , pp. 303 - 310
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Society of Edinburgh 1989

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