Kiisortoqia soperi is a species of arthropod from the Early Cambrian Sirius Passet

Sirius Passet

Sirius Passet is a Cambrian Lagerstätte in Greenland. The Sirius Passet Lagerstätte was named after the Sirius sledge patrol that operates in North Greenland. It comprises six localities located on the eastern shore of J.P. Koch Fjord in the far north of Greenland. It was discovered in 1984 by A....

  in Greenland. Its antennulae resemble anomalocaridid great appendage

Great appendage

Great appendages are large claw-like appendages which attach to the heads of the "great appendage arthropods", a group whose monophyly is debated, but which includes the anomalocaridids...

s.

Morphology

The body of K. soperi consisted of a simple head shield, 16 trunk segments (tergites) and a tail plate. The species reached a length of 234–534 mm (9.2–21 ) and was in outward appearance almost elliptical, about twice as long as wide, with the widest point in the front third of the body at the 3rd to 5th tergite.

The head plate was simple, convex in shape, wider than long, and represented about 20% of the total body length. The tergites were short, about five times as wide as long, and the rear edge of each tergite to overshadow the following by about a fifth of its length. The tergites 1–5 all had about the same width, the following tergites have been coming back ever narrower. In the middle of an axis was clearly seen, which constituted about half the width of a tergite and gave him a three-lobed shape. At the lateral ends of each tergite existed rearwardly longer and longer spines. The tiny tail was semi-circular, about half as long as wide; and the front half had to two-thirds of the tail shield also has a three-lobed shape.

The first segment bore a ventral pair of large limbs, known as the antennule, which are about half to two-thirds as long as the body. They consisted of a cylindrical stem and about 15 segments. The segments had a flat outer side and two widely spaced spines.

The other limbs – three pairs in the head region shield and 16 on the body segments – composed of two branches. The basipod was long, trapezoid-shaped and had two rows with different numbers of spines. The exopods were paddle-like lobes, which were fringed with bristles. The length was little more than two thirds of the length of the endopodite.

Its gut is occasionally preserved in three dimensions, perhaps in phosophate.

Ecology

It is believed that Kiisortoqia was a predatory swimmer. The large paddle-like exopods were probably suitable for swimming. With its robust antennule, K. soperi could capture prey, probably using its prickly basipods to bring them to its mouth.

Etymology

The name of the genus is derived from the Greenlandic word , meaning "predator" or "hunter". The specific epithet is in honor of Norman John (Jack) Soper who, together with A. K. Higgins, discovereed the Sirius Passet fauna and collected the first fossils from the locality.

Distribution

More than 170 specimens of the species were recovered in the course of several expeditions between 1985 and 2006 from the Lower Cambrian Sirius Passet Konservat-Lagerstätte, in Peary Land, northern Greenland. The specimens are usually more or less completely preserved: disarticulated fossils were not discovered.

Systematic position

Kiisortoqia soperi possesses three crown-arthropod homologies: A head shield with three pairs of limbs, plus the antennula; postantennular biramous limbs; and flap-like exopods fringed with setae. An exact position within the arthropods, however, cannot be determined, due to the possible lack of eyes and the ambiguous shape of the tail plate. A possible synapomorphy of the antennules with the Chelicerates is purely speculative.