An Odontogriphid from the Upper Permian of Australia

A problematic organism, Bowengriphus perphlegis gen. et sp. nov., is described based on two specimens from the Late Permian Rangal Coal Measures of eastern central Queensland. It displays a double-looped feeding apparatus bearing small conical elements, considered homologous with that of the supposed lophophorate Odontogriphus omalus Conway Morris, 1976, from the Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale of British Columbia, Canada. Odontogriphids are thus interpreted as a group that survived through the Palaeozoic and made the transition from marine to freshwater environments. Recent proposals that odontogriphids are stem-group chordates are not well established.