The phragmocone is the chambered portion of the shell of a cephalopod

Cephalopod

A cephalopod is any member of the molluscan class Cephalopoda . These exclusively marine animals are characterized by bilateral body symmetry, a prominent head, and a set of arms or tentacles modified from the primitive molluscan foot...

. It is divided by septa

Septa (biology)

Septa are thin walls or partitions between the internal chambers of the shell of a cephalopod, namely nautiloids or ammonoids....

 into camerae

Camerae

Camerae are the spaces or chambers enclosed between two adjacent septa in the phragmocone of a nautiloid or ammonoid cephalopod. These can be seen in cross-sections of a nautilus shell and in the polished cross-sections of ammonites...

.

In most nautiloid

Nautiloid

Nautiloids are a large and diverse group of marine cephalopods belonging to the subclass Nautiloidea that began in the Late Cambrian and are represented today by the living Nautilus. Nautiloids flourished during the early Paleozoic era, where they constituted the main predatory animals, and...

s and ammonoids, the phragmocone is a long, straight, curved, or coiled structure, in which the camarae are linked by a siphuncle

Siphuncle

The siphuncle is a strand of tissue passing longitudinally through the shell of a cephalopod mollusk. Only cephalopods with chambered shells have siphuncles, such as the extinct ammonites and belemnites, and the living nautiluses, cuttlefish, and Spirula...

 which determines buoyancy

Buoyancy

In physics, buoyancy is a force exerted by a fluid that opposes an object's weight. In a column of fluid, pressure increases with depth as a result of the weight of the overlying fluid. Thus a column of fluid, or an object submerged in the fluid, experiences greater pressure at the bottom of the...

 by means of gas exchange.

Despite this benefit, such a large shell adds to the mass of the animal, and hence is not advantageous in catching fast-moving prey. Some nautiloids, such as the Silurian

Silurian

The Silurian is a geologic period and system that extends from the end of the Ordovician Period, about 443.7 ± 1.5 Mya , to the beginning of the Devonian Period, about 416.0 ± 2.8 Mya . As with other geologic periods, the rock beds that define the period's start and end are well identified, but the...

 Ascocerida

Ascocerida

The Ascocerida are comparatively small, bizarre nautiloids known only from Ordovician and Silurian sediments in Europe and North America, uniquely characterized by a deciduous conch consisting of a longiconic juvenile portion and an inflated breviconic adult portion that separate sometime in...

, dropped the phragmocone upon maturity, presumably to increase speed and maneuverability. They thus became the early Paleozoic

Paleozoic

The Paleozoic era is the earliest of three geologic eras of the Phanerozoic eon, spanning from roughly...

 equivalent of coleoids. The early coleoids and belemnoid

Belemnoidea

Belemnoids are an extinct group of marine cephalopod, very similar in many ways to the modern squid and closely related to the modern cuttlefish. Like them, the belemnoids possessed an ink sac, but, unlike the squid, they possessed ten arms of roughly equal length, and no tentacles...

s adopted a different approach. The phragmocone was retained but became internal and reduced, and so like the shell in general it tends to be vestigial or absent in most cephalopods.

Fossil record

Being the only biomineralised part of most cephalopods, the phragmocone is typically the only part to enter the fossil record. It is sometimes infilled with sediment, with sediment presumably getting in through the siphuncle

Siphuncle

The siphuncle is a strand of tissue passing longitudinally through the shell of a cephalopod mollusk. Only cephalopods with chambered shells have siphuncles, such as the extinct ammonites and belemnites, and the living nautiluses, cuttlefish, and Spirula...

.
There are occasions where trilobite

Trilobite

Trilobites are a well-known fossil group of extinct marine arthropods that form the class Trilobita. The first appearance of trilobites in the fossil record defines the base of the Atdabanian stage of the Early Cambrian period , and they flourished throughout the lower Paleozoic era before...

s have been preserved within phragmocones, presumably where they crawled in for refuge.