Bodotriidae is a family of crustacean

Crustacean

Crustaceans form a very large group of arthropods, usually treated as a subphylum, which includes such familiar animals as crabs, lobsters, crayfish, shrimp, krill and barnacles. The 50,000 described species range in size from Stygotantulus stocki at , to the Japanese spider crab with a leg span...

s belonging to the order Cumacea

Cumacea

Cumacea is an order of small marine crustaceans, occasionally called hooded shrimp. Their unique appearance and uniform body plan makes them easy to distinguish from other crustaceans.-Anatomy:...

.

Anatomy

In both sexes the telson

Telson

The telson is the last division of the body of a crustacean. It is not considered a true segment because it does not arise in the embryo from teloblast areas as do real segments. It never carries any appendages, but a forked "tail" called the caudal furca is often present. Together with the...

 is fused with the last segment of the pleon

Pleon

Pleon is a Europe based Public Relations and communications consultancy. It is part of the Brodeur Pleon Worldwide network and a subsidiary of BBDO Worldwide. Pleon belongs to the Omnicom Group. Pleon is headquartered in Düsseldorf, Germany.- Overview :...

, forming a "pleotelson". Males generally have five pairs of pleopods, although less often there may be three, two or they may be entirely absent. In females the second antenna

Antenna (biology)

Antennae in biology have historically been paired appendages used for sensing in arthropods. More recently, the term has also been applied to cilium structures present in most cell types of eukaryotes....

 is substantially shorter than the first. The third maxillipeds always have exopods (outer branches), and there are endopods (inner branches) on one or two segments of the uropods.

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