| These and other attributes have been used to develop scenarios for the origin and evolution of New World sand dollar clades, notably the lunulate forms. |
| Mooi also established that other lunulate taxa such as the Astriclypeidae Stefanini, 1912, were not more closely related to the mellitids than monophorasterids. |
| Postulated as basal lunulate taxa, the monophorasterids are very important to our understanding of major events in the origins of the New World sand dollar faunas. |
| Therefore, we cannot support Durham's derivation of New World lunulate clades from an ancestor in common with protoscutellids, either. |
| They also have important biogeographic implications, given that lunulate sand dollars are today rather rare in the regions in which monophorasterids were once common. |
