A 3-D computer illustration of a Ordovician Sea scene with colonies of the extinct marine animals known as Dictyonema (genus of Graptolites) of the Ordovician period (which occurred from 505 to 438 million years ago). Dictyonema is characterized by branch-like assemblages of graptolite organisms that were rooted to the sea floor which allowed the species to cumulatively grow by feeding on floating organic particles with their feather-like tentacles. Also depicted are the small spherical blastoids that were also common in the era. Though purely an artistic interpretation, the structure of the animals are inferred through scientific notation of what the species may have looked like within the environment in which they existed.

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