Benthozoa

The Benthozoa or Myriazoa^[1] are a proposed basal animal clade consisting of the Porifera and ParaHoxozoa as a sister group of Ctenophora.^[2]

Benthozoa
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Clade:	Benthozoa A. Erives and B. Fritzsch, 2019
Clades
Porifera Eumetazoa (sans Ctenophora)
Synonyms
Myriazoa

An alternative phylogeny is given by the Porifera-sister hypothesis in which Porifera are the first diverging animal group.

Choanozoa

Choanoflagellata Animalia Ctenophora Benthozoa Porifera Eumetazoa / Placozoa Cnidaria Bilateria / Xenacoelomorpha Nephrozoa Deuterostomia Chordata Ambulacraria Protostomia Ecdysozoa Scalidophora (Priapulids and allies) Arthropoda and allies Nematoda and allies > 529 mya Spiralia Gnathifera Rotifera and allies Chaetognatha Platytrochozoa Platyhelminthes and allies Lophotrochozoa Mollusca and allies Annelida and allies 550 mya 580 mya 610 mya 650 mya Triploblasts ParaHoxozoa 760 mya

950 mya

References

1. Schultz, Darrin T.; Haddock, Steven H.D.; Bredeson, Jessen V.; Green, Richard E.; Simakov, Oleg; Rokhsar, Daniel S. (17 May 2023). "Ancient gene linkages support ctenophores as sister to other animals". Nature. doi:10.1038/s41586-023-05936-6. ISSN 0028-0836. PMC 10232365.
2. Erives, Albert; Fritzsch, Bernd (17 July 2019). "A screen for gene paralogies delineating evolutionary branching order of early Metazoa". bioRxiv 10.1101/704551.