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Batiacasphaera taugourdeaui

Baticasphaera taugourdeaui, (Varma and Dangwal, 1964), Dörhöfer and Davies, 1980

Originally Tenua Eisenack, 1958, subsequently Hemicystodinium?, thirdly Batiacasphaera.
Tax. jr. synonym of Polysphaeridium zoharyi (Rossignol, 1962) Bujak et al., 1980, according to Stover and Evitt, 1978, Sarjeant and Stover, 1978, and Lentin and Williams, 1981.
Tax. jr. synonym of Polysphaeridium subtile Davey and Williams, 1966, according to Sarjeant and Stover, 1978, and Lentin and Williams, 1981. Lentin and Williams, 1993, treated this species as a tax. jr. synonym of Polysphaeridium subtile. Lentin and Williams, 1981, retained this species in Hemicystodinium? Wall, 1967.

Holotype: Varma and Dangwal, 1964, pl.2, fig.9
Locus typicus: Western India, Cambay Basin, C.D.W. no. 9. 1475-80 m
Stratum typicum: Eocene-Oligocene

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Original description as Tenua taugourdeaui: [Varma and Dangwal, 1964, p. 68]:

Diagnosis:
Body originally spherical to oblong, incomplete due to the breakage of the pole cap. Body wall prominently granulate, sometimes weak, fairly thick, about 2.5 µm in the specimen illustrated.
Processes arise from all over the body rather sparsely, start with a somewhat broad base and extend outwards as hollow structures of uniform thickness or narrow towards the tip in the form of fingers or bluntly ending spines. The tips are occasionally broken, but, when preserved, they are closed and some times also show slight (?) overgrowth hanging downwards. Processes mostly stiff, rarely supple.

Dimensions:
Diameter of body ca. 55x50 µm; length of processes ca. 7.8 µm.

Affinities:
The pole cap is often missing from the body, as seen in the figure illustrated, a feature of T. hystrix Eisenack, but the present species differs from T. hystrix in having a smaller body and in the shape of the spinelike processes, which are also more sparsely studded.
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