Plaxiphora

Plaxiphora is a genus of chitons in the family Mopaliidae.^[2][3] It is distributed in the Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific Oceans,^[3] primarily in the south-temperate and subantarctic regions.^[4]

Plaxiphora
Dorsal surface of Plaxiphora albida from Tasmania on display at the Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di Milano.
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Mollusca
Class:	Polyplacophora
Order:	Chitonida
Family:	Mopaliidae
Subfamily:	Mopaliinae
Genus:	Plaxiphora Gray, 1847[1]
Species
22 species (see text)
Synonyms
Aerilamma

Species

There are 22 species:^[2]

• Plaxiphora albida (Blainville, 1825)
• Plaxiphora aurata (Spalowsky, 1795)
• Plaxiphora australis (Suter, 1907)
• Plaxiphora biramosa (Quoy & Gaimard, 1835)
• Plaxiphora boydeni R. C. Murdoch, 1982^[4]
• Plaxiphora bucklandnicksi Sirenko, 2012
• Plaxiphora caelata (Reeve, 1847)
• Plaxiphora egregia (H. Adams, 1867)
• Plaxiphora fernandezi Thiele, 1909
• Plaxiphora gwenae A. J. Ferreira, 1987
• Plaxiphora indica Thiele, 1909
• Plaxiphora integra (Is. Taki, 1954)
• Plaxiphora javanica Kaas & Van Belle, 1994
• Plaxiphora kamehamehae A. J. Ferreira & Bertsch, 1979
• Plaxiphora matthewsi Iredale, 1910
• Plaxiphora mercatoris Leloup, 1936
• Plaxiphora murdochi Suter, 1905
• Plaxiphora obscurella (Souverbie, 1866)
• Plaxiphora obtecta Carpenter, 1893
• Plaxiphora parva Nierstrasz, 1906
• Plaxiphora tricolor Thiele, 1909
• Plaxiphora tulearensis Leloup, 1981

Extinct species

In 2024, Sirenko and Dell'Angelo described the first extinct species of the genus, Plaxiphorma luzanovskae, discovered through fossils from the Paleocene of Ukraine.^[5]