Nannotax Enabling nannofossil research

Description: Coccospheres with Pontosphaera-like body coccoliths and equatorial coccoliths with rims elevated into vase-like structures (lopadoliths).

Remarks: In fossil assemblages, only lopadoliths are assigned to Scyphosphaera.
Numerous Neogene species have been described, often based on subtle variations in outline, but since the single modern species S. apsteinii shows considerable variation in lopadolith outline a broader species concept seems justified. There is, however, far more variation in Scyphosphaera morphology in the Late Miocene and Pliocene than in the Quaternary and at the present day. Three main late Neogene species are certainly separable; S. apsteinii, S. pulcherimma and S. globulata. The table below summarises the main Neogene morphotypes and for each one possible synonyms are listed on the species page. This arguably represents a useful compromise between the extremes of lumping to three species or splitting to 30 or more. See also Jafar (1975), Perch-Nielsen (1984) Aubry (1990) and Siesser (1998).

Original description:

	apsteinii		pulcherrima
	globulata		tubifera
	intermedia		ventriosa
	lagena		cylindrica