Lovenia cordiformis

It is a heart urchin (an irregular echinoid) from the eastern Pacific, described by Alexander Agassiz in 1872. Records of it come from sandy seafloors off California and Mexico.

The name 'cordiformis' literally means heart-shaped, referring to its bilateral outline, which differs from the round symmetry of regular urchins. Species of Lovenia burrow in sand and use their dense small spines to move through sediment.

It is recorded from sandy seafloors of the eastern Pacific, off California and Mexico. As a deposit-feeding heart urchin, it spends much of its life partially buried in the sediment rather than exposed on rocks.

The genus is generally understood to honor Sven Ludvig Lovén, the 19th-century Swedish zoologist who did foundational work on echinoderms. The species Lovenia cordiformis itself was described by Alexander Agassiz in 1872.