Family PSEUDOAULOPHACIDAE Riedel, 1967
Pseudoaulophacidae Riedel, 1967a: 148; 1967b: 295; 1971: 654- 655. — Pessagno 1972: 296-297 (sensu emend.); 1977b: 932. — Nakaseko et al. 1975: 169. — Nakaseko & Sugano 1976: 126. — Foreman 1978: 744. — Kozur & Mostler 1978: 155. — Dumitrica 1979: 25; 1997: 212-214. — Schaaf 1984: 49. — Sanfilippo & Riedel 1985: 593-594. — Carter et al. 1988: 43. — O’Dogherty 1994: 315. — Dumitrica 1995: 26. — Kiessling 1999: 39. — Amon 2000: 45. — De Wever et al. 2001: 143-144. — Afanasieva et al. 2005: S286. — Afanasieva & Amon 2006: 128.
Pentapyloniinae Dumitrica in De Wever, Dumitrica, Caulet, Nigrini & Caridroit, 2001: 146. — Afanasieva et al. 2005: S286. — Afanasieva & Amon 2006: 128.
Pseudoaulophacinae – De Wever et al. 2001: 144, 146 (sensu emend.).— Afanasieva et al. 2005: S286. — Afanasieva & Amon 2006: 128.
TYPE GENUS. — Pseudoaulophacus Pessagno, 1963: 200 [type species by objective designation: Pseudoaulophacus floresensis Pessagno, 1963: 200].
INCLUDED GENERA (CENOZOIC ONLY). — Pentapylonium Dumitrica, 1991: 37.
DIAGNOSIS. — Spongy discoidal spumellarians with surface completely or partially covered by a meshwork of equilateral triangular frames. The microsphere is shaped like triangular prism with 3 primary rays originating from its lateral edges.
STRATIGRAPHIC OCCURRENCE. —early Early Miocene-Early Pliocene.
REMARKS
The internal skeletal structure of Pentapylonium was already illustrated (Dumitrica 1991: pl. 5, figs 1-9; pl. 6, figs 1-9; pl. 7, figs 1-7). As reporting of Pentapylonium implicatum is limited to the upwelling regions off Peru, Oman and Somali (Nigrini & Caulet 1992), this family can rarely be observed in other regions. The overall appearance of Sphaeropylolena (Pylodiscidae) is similar to that of Pentapylonium, but the former fundamentally differs from the latter by the presence of a pylodiscid center (Zhang & Suzuki 2017: 38).