Bryobaculum carinatum gen. et sp. nov.: a new Mediterranean Pliocene deep-water bryozoan

A new species of an articulate branching bryozoan arising from an encrusting base is described from deep-sea Upper Pliocene sediments that crop out in NE Sicily. The colony is formed by quadriserial rodlike branches consisting of twins of back-to-back zooids, each rotated at 90° from the previous one. The zooids have a finely granular, sparsely porous frontal wall and a sinuated orifice, without spines. The species is characterised by paired orificai adventitious avicuiaria; hyperstomial, finely granular ovicells not closed by the operculum and bearing two small uncalcified symmetrical slits; and frontal kenozooids to articulate lateral branches. The distinctive features of this species do not allow a suitable attribution to the already known generic and familial taxa. Thus a new genus is described and a new family proposed to accommodate the new species. The growth pattern is described. The meaning of the species in the rccolonisation of the Mediterranean after the Messinian salinity crisis is discussed.