Brachiopods

By: Mumtaz A. Khan

• Brachiopods (brachio=arm; pod = foot)
• Valves are opened and closed by contracting
muscles called adductor and diductor
muscles.
Classification & Geological Ranges
• Phylum Brachiopoda (Cambrian-Recent)
• Class Inarticulata (Cambrian-Recent)
• Class Articulata (Cambrian-Recent)
– Order Orthida (Cambrian-Permian)
– Order Strophomenida (Ordovician-Jurassic)
– Order Pentamerida (Cambrian-Devonian)
– Order Rhynchonellida (Ordovician-Recent)
– Order Spiriferida (Ordovician-Jurassic)
– Order Terebratulida (Devonian-Recent)
 General Characteristics
• Exclusively marine
• Live in environments ranging from subtidal to
the abyssal
• Brachiopods swim only during larval stage
• Widespread distribution reflects free-
swimming larval stage
• Brachiopods occur throughout the world in
both cool and temperate waters (Japan, S.
Australia, and New Zealand).
• Most brachiopods found in the Neritic zone
(waters over the continental shelf), a few are
found at depths of 5000 m
• Attached to seafloor by pedicle at posterior
• Adult brachiopods are filter feeders
• Filter food particles from water
• Food passes from mouth to the esophagus to
stomach
• Animals feeding on brachiopods include
starfish, crustaceans, gastropods, and fish.
 Size
• Most brachiopods range between 20 and 70 mm, some are
up to 370 mm.
• Resemble clams, but clams not attached
 Brachiopod Classes
• Articulata and
Inarticulata.
• Articulate have
calcareous hinged valves
• Inarticulate have valves
held together by muscles
and composed of chitin
and calcium phosphate.
• Very few inarticulate
brachiopods are
calcareous
 Cont…
• Class INARTICULATA
• Inarticulate brachiopods do not posses teeth
and sockets, nor do they have clearly defined
diductor muscles.
• Instead, the valves are held together by a
complex of adductor muscles.
• Inarticulate brachiopods usually lack surficial
ornamentation except growth lines.
 Cont….
• Class ARTICULATA
• Articulate brachiopods differ from inarticulate
in that the articulates posses teeth and sockets
and mineralized lopophore supports.
Brachiopod Valves
 Symmetry of Brachiopods
• The two valves of brachiopods are quite
different.
• The pedicle valve bears all (or most) of the
pedicle opening; it is the lower (therefore
ventral) of the two valves.
• The brachial valve contains supports for the
lophophores; it is the upper (therefore dorsal)
of the two valves
 Cont…..
• The anterior of the brachiopod is the part
opposite of the beak and hinge line; whereas
the beak and hinge area are posterior.
• The width of the brachiopod shell is measured
as the maximum dimension parallel to the
hinge line; whereas the length of the shell is
measured normal to the width (from the beak
to commissure).
Cont….
Morphology
Morphology
 Morphology
• Brachial valve: one of the two main parts of
brachiopod shell; bears supports for lopophore or
brachia, and is dorsal in position.
• Pedicle valve: the valve of brachiopod shell that
bears pedicle, ventral in position.
• Delthyrium: Mark beneath the beak of pedicle
valve for passage of pedicle.
• Beak: Initial point of growth of a valve. It can be
located by tracing radial ornamentation to its
origin.
• Lopophore: A horseshoe-shaped ciliated
organ located near the mouth of brachiopods,
that is used to gather food.
• Commissure and Commissural Plane: The
commissure is the juncture of the growing
margin of the two valves. The commissural
plane is the plane between two valves.
• Astrophic: Not having a well defined hinge
line.
• Strophic: having an elongated and well
defined hinge line. 
 Lopophore
Commissure
• Inter-area: Plate of curved surface of a valve
between the beak and hinge line; typically
bears the triangular or in some cases a circular
pedicle opening.
• Fold and Sulcus: In many brachiopod shells,
an "anticline" (fold) along the mid-line of one
valve is associated with a "syncline" (sulcus)
along the midline of the other valve. Note that
the fold is in the brachial valve and the sulcus
is in the pedicle valve.
Inter area
Fold & Sulcus
• Costae and Plicae: Costae are radial ridges
originating from the beak that are visible only on the
valve exterior; whereas plicae are radial ridges visible
on both valve exterior and interior. A shell is termed
plicate if it exhibits plicae and costate if it has costae.
• Cardinal Process: A knob at the mid-line of brachial
valve interior to which the diductor muscles attach.
• Deltidial plates: Pairs of shelly plates, growing
medially from the delthyrial margins, constricting
the pedicle foramen.
• Pedicle Opening: Aperture or slit from which the
pedicle emerges. Some brachiopods do not have a
functional pedicle and thus do not have any
opening. Several types of openings are common
including:
1. Circular opening near beak of pedicle valve. 
2. Triangular opening usually in the pedicle valve
inter-area but may be expressed in both valves.
3. Slit in either one valve (the pedicle) or in both
valves, whose openings are produced by gapes.
 Triangle

Circular

Slit
• Teeth and Sockets: Knob-like protrusions
(teeth) on the hinge of the pedicle valve fits
into the small depressions (sockets) on the
hinge of the brachial valve.
• Adductor Scars: Mark the attachment sites of
valve closing muscles. They occur as a small
pair of impressions in the pedicle valve
interior and as larger impressions on the
brachial valve interior.
 Cont…
• Diductor muscles: The paired muscles which,
on contraction, open the shell by pulling on the
cardinal process, situated on the opposite side
of the hinge axis from the ventral areas of
attachment.
• Adductor Muscles: The paired muscles which,
on contraction, close the shell. Each is
commonly divided
into anterior and posterior elements.
• Diductor Scars: These mark the attachment
sites of valve opening muscles. They occur as
a large pair of impressions only on the pedicle
valve interior where they are either outside or
enclose the smaller adductor muscle scars.
• Growth lines: marking on shell surface
parallel to valve margin, indicating former
position of this margin.
• Hinge line: edge of the shell where two valves
articulate.
• Lophophore Supports: Three common types
include:
1. Brachiophores are a pair of short spikes
pointing inward along the brachial valve hinge
line.
2. Spiralia are a pair of spiral structures
occupying much of the shell interior, but are
attached to the brachial valve. Axis of coiling
can be vertical or horizontal. 
3. Loops are hoop shaped structures, sometimes
bent double, that are attached to the brachial
valve. 
 Geologic History
• Brachiopods first show up in the early
Cambrian
• reached a maximum in Silurian and Devonian.

• Thereafter, declined and only a few

brachiopods made it into the Mesozoic.
• Brachiopods not abundant in the Tertiary, and
they are not common today.
 Cont….
• Inarticulate brachiopods not common after
Cambrian, but more common in Cambrian
than articulates.
• Articulate brachiopods especially common in
Ordovician and decline in Carboniferous
Permian
 Occurrences in Pakistan
• Khewra Sandstone
• Kussak Formation
• Juttana Dolomite
• Chiddru Formation
• Amb Formation
• Wargal Limestone
• Mianwali Formation, etc…..
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