Sipunculus
Sipunculus is a genus of worms belonging to the family Sipunculidae.
Taxonomy
Sipunculus is a variant spelling of the Latin , a diminutive of sipho from Greek .Siphunculus was used for fossilized worm-shaped organisms like Siphunculus scaber by the Welsh naturalist Edward Lhuyd in 1699. In the next century, the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus used the scientific name Sipunculus nudus for a species of worms in his 1766 Systema Naturae. In 1814, the French zoologist Constantine Samuel Rafinesque used the feminine form Sipuncula to distinguish the family including S. nudus; this was later elevated to the Sipuncula class, the family being renamed Sipunculidae and the species reorganized into different genera.
Distribution
The genus has cosmopolitan distribution.Species
Species included in Sipunculus are:- Sipunculus angasoides
- Sipunculus clavatus
- Sipunculus corallicolus
- Sipunculus echinorhynchus
- Sipunculus gulfus
- Sipunculus indicus
- Sipunculus lomonossovi
- Sipunculus longipapillosus
- Sipunculus macrorhynchus
- Sipunculus marcusi
- Sipunculus microrhynchus
- Sipunculus mundanus
- Sipunculus norvegicus
- Sipunculus nudus
- Sipunculus phalloides
- Sipunculus polymyotus
- Sipunculus robustus
- Sipunculus rubens
- Sipunculus rufofimbriatus
- Sipunculus saccatus
- Sipunculus thailandicus
- ''Sipunculus zenkevitchi''