Micromorphology of the Aristotle’s Lantern in the Sand Dollar, Scaphechinus mirabilis (Echinoidea: Echinolampadacea): Insights from Scanning Electron Microscopy and Three-Dimensional X-Ray Microscopy
Eun Ha Kim, Jung Jun Park, Chang-Moon Lee, Hyeon Jin Kim, Jung Sick Lee · 2026
Read Micromorphology of the Aristotle’s Lantern in the Sand Dollar, Scaphechinus mirabilis (Echinoidea: Echinolampadacea): Insights from Scanning Electron Microscopy and Three-Dimensional X-Ray Microscopy by Eun Ha Kim, Jung Jun Park, Chang-Moon Lee, Hyeon Jin Kim, Jung Sick Lee (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/pmc-13564506.txt.
Description
Eun Ha Kim, Jung Jun Park, Chang-Moon Lee, Hyeon Jin Kim, and Jung Sick Lee describe a sand dollar's feeding apparatus in this two thousand twenty-six paper. Aristotle's lantern is the jaw-like structure sea urchins use to eat; in Scaphechinus mirabilis its fine structure was unmapped. The team combined light microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, and three-dimensional X-ray microscopy.
The lantern is a star-shaped calcareous assembly of pyramids, joints, and teeth on the shell. Each pyramid splits into two demi-pyramids with an epiphysis and a bump; joints combine ligaments and a rotula. A tooth is an elongated trapezoid, about four millimeters long, with an embedded part tied to ligament and muscle and a projecting part meeting the food. Its fifteen to twenty calcareous layers end in a worn tip. The authors read the tooth as specialized for crushing sediment and food particles internally.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Eun Ha Kim, Jung Jun Park, Chang-Moon Lee, Hyeon Jin Kim, Jung Sick Lee |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 33 KB |
| VERSION | 1.0 |
| LICENSE | CC BY 4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |