Marshallena nierstraszi

Marshallena nierstraszi
Shell of Marshallena nierstraszi (specimen at MNHN, Paris)
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Mollusca
Class:	Gastropoda
Subclass:	Caenogastropoda
Order:	Neogastropoda
Superfamily:	Conoidea
Family:	Marshallenidae
Genus:	Marshallena
Species:	M. nierstraszi
Binomial name
Marshallena nierstraszi (Schepman, 1913)
Synonyms [1]
Surcula nierstrasziSchepman, 1913

Marshallena nierstraszi is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Marshallenidae ^[1]

Description

The length of the shell attains 25¼ mm, its diameter 12¼ mm.

(Original description) The thin shell is broadly fusiform, with a rather short spire. It is light greyish-white. The protoconch is wanting. The six remaining whorls, of which the upper one is likewise eroded, are angularly convex, and slightly excavated below the deep suture. The sculpture consists of slightly oblique, narrow ribs, arcuated in the excavation, 15 in number in the penultimate whorl, with blunt tubercles about the median part of upper whorls and on the shoulder of the body whorl, with beads at their upper extremities. Just below the suture, the shell is covered with fine growth striae and spiral lirae, these lirations being faint in the excavation, stronger and crowded in lower part of whorls, more remote on the siphonal canal; the body whorl attenuated below, passing without marked limit in the rather short canal. The aperture is oval, slightly angular above, with a rather narrow siphonal canal below. The peristome is broken, according to growth striae with a very shallow sinus below the suture. The columellar margin is concave above, directed to the left along the siphonal canal, with a thin layer of enamel. The operculum is thin, corneous, with a terminal nucleus at the left side. The radula shows 2 rows of teeth, in about 12 transverse rows, each tooth with a rather sharp point and a deep sinus at its basal margin, separating .2 unequal digitations. ^[2]

Distribution

This marine species occurs off Celebes and in the Arafura Sea at a depth of 1788 m; also in the China Sea at a depth between 958 m and-988 m.

References

1. Marshallena nierstraszi (Schepman, 1913) . Retrieved through: World Register of Marine Species  on 31 March 2010.
2. Schepman, 1913. The prosobranchia of the Siboga expedition. Part IV -V - VI: Toxoglossa

• Sysoev, Alexander. Mollusca Gastropoda: new deep-water turrid gastropods (Conoidea) from eastern Indonesia. Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle, 1997.