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Wufengella is a genus of extinct camenellan "tommotiid" that lived during the Early Cambrian (Stage 3). Described in 2022, the Monotypic taxon Wufengella bengtsoni was discovered from the Maotianshan Shales of Chiungchussu (Qiongzhusi) Formation in Yunnan, China. The fossil indicates that the animal was an armoured worm that close to the common ancestry of the phyla Brachiozoa and Bryozoa, which are collectively grouped into a clade called Lophophorata.
The name Wufengalla is after the Wufeng Hill in Chengjiang. Wufeng is a Chinese word for "dancing/flying phoenix." The species name was given to honour Stefan Bengtson, a palaeontologist at the Swedish Museum of Natural History. The specimen (CJHMD00041) is maintained at the Nature Museum of Yunnan. Luke A. Parry at the University of Oxford identified the specimen as a tommotiid worm, and the description was published in Current Biology.
The back (dorsal) side of Wufengella is studded with armoured plates called sclerites. The sclerites are arranged almost randomly (bilaterally asymmetrical) throughout the body. However, there is some pattern of organisation. The larger major sclerites are aligned in two rows along the body length, and the tiny minor ones are distributed unevenly in between the two major rows.
Another feature is body segmentation. The arrangement of the sclerites and the bristles indicate that the body is transversely segmented as in modern annelid worms. This suggest that Wufengella could be related to the common ancestor of annelids and brachiopods. In addition, the over structure indicates that it could be close to the common ancestry Phoronid, Brachiozoa and Bryozoa. The three phyla are established to constitute the same evolutionary lineage and are collectively grouped into a clade called Lophophorata. It has been predicted that the last common ancestor of the lophophorates would be a sessile, lophophore-bearing suspension feeder having U-shaped gut (called lophophore), The fact that Wufengella was mobile implies that it lies outside the crown group of Lophophorata.
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