| Chondrostei | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Atlantic sturgeon,Acipenser oxyrinchus | |
Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Actinopterygii |
| Subclass: | Chondrostei Müller, 1844 |
| Orders | |
See text | |
Chondrostei is asubclass of non-neopterygianray-finned fish. While the term originally referred to theparaphyletic grouping of all non-neopterygian ray-finned fish, it was redefined by Patterson in 1982 to be a clade comprising theAcipenseriformes (which includessturgeon andpaddlefish) and their extinct relatives.[1]
Taxa commonly suggested to represent relatives of the Acipenseriformes include the Triassic marine fishBirgeria and theSaurichthyiformes, but their relationship with the Acipenseriformes has been strongly challenged oncladistic grounds.[2]Coccolepididae, a group of small weakly ossified Jurassic and Cretaceous fish found in both marine and freshwater environments, have also been suggested to be close relatives of the Acipenseriformes. However, this has never been subject to cladistic analysis.[1] Near & Thacker (2024) also recovered theptycholepiformBoreosomus as a stem-acipenseriform.[3]
The following taxa are known:[4]
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
.jpg)
.png)
