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Krill feeding in a high phytoplankton concentration (slowed by a factor of 12). Filter feeders are aquatic animals that acquire nutrients by feeding on organic matters, food particles or smaller organisms (bacteria, microalgae and zooplanktons) suspended in water, typically by having the water pass over or through a specialized filtering organ that sieves out and/or traps solids.
The lophophore surrounds the mouth and is an upstream collecting system for suspension feeding. Its tentacles are hollow, with extensions of a coelomic space thought to be a mesocoel. The gut is U-shaped with the anterior mouth at the center of the lophophore. The anus, where present, is also anterior, but is dorsal to the mouth.
With prey capture times of down to 5 ms (shrimpfish Centriscus scutatus) this method is used by the fastest feeders in the animal kingdom. The secret of the speed of pivot feeding is in a locking mechanism, in which the hyoid arch is folded under the head and is aligned with the urohyal which connects to the shoulder girdle.
Barnacle adults are sessile; most are suspension feeders with hard calcareous shells, but the Rhizocephala are specialized parasites of other crustaceans, with reduced bodies. Barnacles have existed since at least the mid-Carboniferous, some 325 million years ago.
In suspension feeders, the trophi are covered in grinding ridges, while in more actively carnivorous species, they may be shaped like forceps to help bite into prey. In some ectoparasitic rotifers, the mastax is adapted to grip onto the host, although, in others, the foot performs this function instead.
Graptolite fossils were later referred to a variety of groups, including other branching colonial animals such as bryozoans ("moss animals") and hydrozoans. The term Graptolithina was established by Bronn in 1849, who considered them to represent orthoconic cephalopods.