Cambropachycope is a genus of small (long) extinct Cambrian arthropods, known from the Orsten lagerstätten in southern Sweden. It appears to have several apomorphic features, notably including a single large compound eye.[1]
The head of Cambropachycope has an unusual anterior projection that bears a single, large compound eye. The eye structure is well preserved, and shows three layers in the cornea, an outermost and innermost layer of transparent material and a hollow middle layer containing a dark material. This middle layer was probably used for filtering out the blue, scattered light from sunlight.[2] There are four pairs of appendages on its head. The first pair of appendages are treated as antenna, and the other pair is biramous. The mouth opens on the ventral surface in front of the second pair of appendages. Its abdomen has four segments with two pairs of paddle-shaped appendages and a telson.
According to its eye structure, Cambropachycope was probably a predator.
It is hesitantly presumed to be an early offshoot under the clade Pancrustacea in original description. It consists of the species Cambropachycope clarksoni. Other organisms, including Henningsmoenicaris and Martinssonia also discovered in Orsten, may exist at a similar place on the phylogenetic tree. Collectively, this may have implications for the origins of the crustaceans. However, later study placed this genus outside Pancrustacea, and just treated as stem-group Mandibulata.[3]