The Lancelet
By Nicholas Holland
Also known as "amphioxus," this curious creature has returned to the limelight as a player in the phylogenetic history of the vertebrates
This Article From Issue
November-December 1998
Volume 86, Number 6
Page 552
DOI: 10.1511/1998.43.552
Lancelets have long occupied a key place in a famous paternity suit: the question of how the vertebrates evolved from the invertebrates. Resembling a small, colorless anchovy fillet without obvious eyes or lateral fins, the lancelet is classified as a cephalochordate, a member of the phylum Chordata.
D. W. Miller
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