Genus ( / ˈ dʒ iː n ə s / ; pl. : genera / ˈ dʒ ɛ n ər ə / ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family as used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses . In binomial nomenclature , the genus name forms the first part of the binomial species name for each species within the genus.
60-506: See text. Protomyctophum is a genus of lanternfishes . There are currently 16 recognized species in this genus: This Myctophiformes -related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Genus The composition of a genus is determined by taxonomists . The standards for genus classification are not strictly codified, so different authorities often produce different classifications for genera. There are some general practices used, however, including
120-508: A script typeface where a more decorative form was preferred. He made an attempt to promote the idea by commissioning the typeface Perpetua from Eric Gill with a sloped roman rather than an italic, but came to find the style unattractive; Perpetua's italic when finally issued had the conventional italic a , e and f . Morison wrote to his friend, type designer Jan van Krimpen , that in developing Perpetua's italic "we did not give enough slope to it. When we added more slope, it seemed that
180-557: A species : see Botanical name and Specific name (zoology) . The rules for the scientific names of organisms are laid down in the nomenclature codes , which allow each species a single unique name that, for animals (including protists ), plants (also including algae and fungi ) and prokaryotes ( bacteria and archaea ), is Latin and binomial in form; this contrasts with common or vernacular names , which are non-standardized, can be non-unique, and typically also vary by country and language of usage. Except for viruses ,
240-487: A handwriting style called chancery hand . Aldus Manutius and Ludovico Arrighi (both between the 15th and 16th centuries) were the main type designers involved in this process at the time. Italic type was first used by Aldus Manutius and his press in Venice in 1500. Manutius intended his italic type to be used not for emphasis but for the text of small, easily carried editions of popular books (often poetry), replicating
300-643: A later homonym of a validly published name is a nomen illegitimum or nom. illeg. ; for a full list refer to the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants and the work cited above by Hawksworth, 2010. In place of the "valid taxon" in zoology, the nearest equivalent in botany is " correct name " or "current name" which can, again, differ or change with alternative taxonomic treatments or new information that results in previously accepted genera being combined or split. Prokaryote and virus codes of nomenclature also exist which serve as
360-621: A long time and redescribed as new by a range of subsequent workers, or if a range of genera previously considered separate taxa have subsequently been consolidated into one. For example, the World Register of Marine Species presently lists 8 genus-level synonyms for the sperm whale genus Physeter Linnaeus, 1758, and 13 for the bivalve genus Pecten O.F. Müller, 1776. Within the same kingdom, one generic name can apply to one genus only. However, many names have been assigned (usually unintentionally) to two or more different genera. For example,
420-532: A manuscript directs a typesetter to use italic. In fonts which do not have true italics, oblique type may be used instead. The difference between true italics and oblique type is that true italics have some letterforms different from the roman type, but in oblique type letters are just slanted without changing the roman type form. The name comes from the fact that calligraphy-inspired typefaces were first designed in Italy , to replace documents traditionally written in
480-632: A more eccentric alternative. This italic face was designed by Alfred Fairbank and named "Bembo Condensed Italic", Monotype series 294 . Some Arts and Crafts movement -influenced printers such as Gill also revived the original italic system of italic lower-case only from the nineteenth century onwards. The Chicago Manual of Style suggests that parentheses and brackets surrounding text that begins and ends in italic or oblique type should also be italicised (as in this example) , to avoid problems such as overlapping and unequally spaced characters. An exception to this rule applies when only one end of
540-409: A reference for designating currently accepted genus names as opposed to others which may be either reduced to synonymy, or, in the case of prokaryotes, relegated to a status of "names without standing in prokaryotic nomenclature". An available (zoological) or validly published (botanical) name that has been historically applied to a genus but is not regarded as the accepted (current/valid) name for
600-437: A roman type and an oblique version (generally called "italic" though often not true italics). In this usage, italics are a way to emphasise key points in a printed text, to identify many types of creative works, to cite foreign words or phrases, or, when quoting a speaker, a way to show which words they stressed. One manual of English usage described italics as "the print equivalent of underlining "; in other words, underscore in
660-453: A run of italics needs to be italicised itself, the type is normally switched back to non-italicized ( roman ) type: " I think The Scarlet Letter had a chapter about that , thought Mary." In this example, the title (" The Scarlet Letter ") is within an italicised thought process and therefore this title is non-italicised. It is followed by the main narrative that is outside both. It is also non-italicised and therefore not obviously separated from
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#1733092710458720-427: A taxon; however, the names published in suppressed works are made unavailable via the relevant Opinion dealing with the work in question. In botany, similar concepts exist but with different labels. The botanical equivalent of zoology's "available name" is a validly published name . An invalidly published name is a nomen invalidum or nom. inval. ; a rejected name is a nomen rejiciendum or nom. rej. ;
780-455: A total of c. 520,000 published names (including synonyms) as at end 2019, increasing at some 2,500 published generic names per year. "Official" registers of taxon names at all ranks, including genera, exist for a few groups only such as viruses and prokaryotes, while for others there are compendia with no "official" standing such as Index Fungorum for fungi, Index Nominum Algarum and AlgaeBase for algae, Index Nominum Genericorum and
840-511: A true italic a and e in his sans-serif Bliss due to finding them "too soft", while Hoefler and Frere-Jones have described obliques as more "keen and insistent" than true italics. Adrian Frutiger has described obliques as more appropriate to the aesthetic of sans-serifs than italics. In contrast, Martin Majoor has argued that obliques do not contrast enough from the regular style. Almost all modern serif fonts have true italic designs. In
900-438: A very small format, so that they may more conveniently be held in the hand and learned by heart (not to speak of being read) by everyone. Manutius' italic was different in some ways from modern italics, being conceived for the specific use of replicating the layout of contemporary calligraphers like Pomponio Leto and Bartolomeo Sanvito . The capital letters were upright capitals on the model of Roman square capitals , shorter than
960-596: Is discouraged by both the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature and the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants , there are some five thousand such names in use in more than one kingdom. For instance, A list of generic homonyms (with their authorities), including both available (validly published) and selected unavailable names, has been compiled by the Interim Register of Marine and Nonmarine Genera (IRMNG). The type genus forms
1020-428: Is mathematical typesetting. Font families with an upright or near-upright italic only include Jan van Krimpen 's Romanée, Eric Gill 's Joanna , Martin Majoor 's FF Seria and Frederic Goudy 's Deepdene . The popular book typeface Bembo has been sold with two italics: one reasonably straightforward design that is commonly used today, and an alternative upright 'Condensed Italic' design, far more calligraphic, as
1080-460: Is somewhat arbitrary. Although all species within a genus are supposed to be "similar", there are no objective criteria for grouping species into genera. There is much debate among zoologists about whether enormous, species-rich genera should be maintained, as it is extremely difficult to come up with identification keys or even character sets that distinguish all species. Hence, many taxonomists argue in favor of breaking down large genera. For instance,
1140-474: Is the type species , and the generic name is permanently associated with the type specimen of its type species. Should the specimen turn out to be assignable to another genus, the generic name linked to it becomes a junior synonym and the remaining taxa in the former genus need to be reassessed. In zoological usage, taxonomic names, including those of genera, are classified as "available" or "unavailable". Available names are those published in accordance with
1200-516: The <em> element, because it conveys that the content is to be emphasised, even if it cannot be displayed in italics. Conversely, if the italics are purely ornamental rather than meaningful, then semantic markup practices would dictate that the author use the Cascading Style Sheets declaration font-style: italic; along with an appropriate, semantic class name instead of an <i> or <em> element. In Unicode ,
1260-494: The ital feature tag to substitute a character to italic form with single font. In addition, the OpenType Font Variation has ital axis for the transition between italic and non-italic forms and slnt axis for the oblique angle of characters. In HTML , the <i> element is used to produce italic (or oblique ) text. When the author wants to indicate emphasised text, modern Web standards recommend using
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#17330927104581320-621: The International Code of Zoological Nomenclature ; the earliest such name for any taxon (for example, a genus) should then be selected as the " valid " (i.e., current or accepted) name for the taxon in question. Consequently, there will be more available names than valid names at any point in time; which names are currently in use depending on the judgement of taxonomists in either combining taxa described under multiple names, or splitting taxa which may bring available names previously treated as synonyms back into use. "Unavailable" names in zoology comprise names that either were not published according to
1380-799: The International Plant Names Index for plants in general, and ferns through angiosperms, respectively, and Nomenclator Zoologicus and the Index to Organism Names for zoological names. Totals for both "all names" and estimates for "accepted names" as held in the Interim Register of Marine and Nonmarine Genera (IRMNG) are broken down further in the publication by Rees et al., 2020 cited above. The accepted names estimates are as follows, broken down by kingdom: The cited ranges of uncertainty arise because IRMNG lists "uncertain" names (not researched therein) in addition to known "accepted" names;
1440-404: The platypus belongs to the genus Ornithorhynchus although George Shaw named it Platypus in 1799 (these two names are thus synonyms ) . However, the name Platypus had already been given to a group of ambrosia beetles by Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Herbst in 1793. A name that means two different things is a homonym . Since beetles and platypuses are both members of the kingdom Animalia,
1500-469: The French botanist Joseph Pitton de Tournefort (1656–1708) is considered "the founder of the modern concept of genera". The scientific name (or the scientific epithet) of a genus is also called the generic name ; in modern style guides and science, it is always capitalised. It plays a fundamental role in binomial nomenclature , the system of naming organisms , where it is combined with the scientific name of
1560-633: The ascenders. Italic capitals with a slope were introduced in the sixteenth century. The first printer known to have used them was Johann or Johannes Singriener in Vienna in 1524, and the practice spread to Germany, France and Belgium. Particularly influential in the switch to sloped capitals as a general practice was Robert Granjon , a prolific and extremely precise French punchcutter particularly renowned for his skill in cutting italics. Vervliet comments that among punchcutters in France "the main name associated with
1620-501: The ascending lower-case italic letters, and were used at the start of each line followed by a clear space before the first lower-case letter. While modern italics are often more condensed than roman types , historian Harry Carter describes Manutius' italic as about the same width as roman type. To replicate handwriting, Griffo cut at least sixty-five tied letters ( ligatures ) in the Aldine Dante and Virgil of 1501. Italic typefaces of
1680-442: The base for higher taxonomic ranks, such as the family name Canidae ("Canids") based on Canis . However, this does not typically ascend more than one or two levels: the order to which dogs and wolves belong is Carnivora ("Carnivores"). The numbers of either accepted, or all published genus names is not known precisely; Rees et al., 2020 estimate that approximately 310,000 accepted names (valid taxa) may exist, out of
1740-556: The bigger sizes." Chancery italics were introduced around 1524 by Arrighi, a calligrapher and author of a calligraphy textbook who began a career as a printer in Rome, and also by Giovanni Antonio Tagliente of Venice, with imitations rapidly appearing in France by 1528. Chancery italics faded as a style over the course of the sixteenth century, although revivals were made beginning in the twentieth century. Chancery italics may have backward-pointing serifs or round terminals pointing forwards on
1800-430: The change is Granjon's." The evolution of use of italic to show emphasis happened in the sixteenth century and was a clear norm by the seventeenth. The trend of presenting types as matching in typefounders' specimens developed also over this period. Italics developed stylistically over the following centuries, tracking changing tastes in calligraphy and type design. One major development that slowly became popular from
1860-803: The character Aldino, while others called it Italic. Italics spread rapidly; historian H. D. L. Vervliet dates the first production of italics in Paris to 1512. Some printers of Northern Europe used home-made supplements to add characters not used in Italian, or mated it to alternative capitals, including Gothic ones. Besides imitations of Griffo's italic and its derivatives, a second wave appeared of "chancery" italics , most popular in Italy, which Vervliet describes as being based on "a more deliberate and formal handwriting [with] longer ascenders and descenders, sometimes with curved or bulbous terminals, and [often] only available in
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1920-499: The end of the seventeenth century was a switch to an open form h matching the n , a development seen in the Romain du roi type of the 1690s, replacing the folded, closed-form h of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century italics, and sometimes simplification of the entrance stroke. True italic styles are traditionally somewhat narrower than roman fonts. Here is an example of normal ( roman ) and true italics text: In oblique text,
1980-540: The following century used varying but reduced numbers of ligatures. Italic type rapidly became very popular and was widely (and inaccurately) imitated. The Venetian Senate gave Aldus exclusive right to its use, a patent confirmed by three successive Popes , but it was widely counterfeited as early as 1502. Griffo, who had left Venice in a business dispute, cut a version for printer Girolamo "Gershom" Soncino , and other copies appeared in Italy and in Lyons . The Italians called
2040-692: The font required a little more cursive to it." A few other type designers replicated his approach for a time: Van Krimpen's Romulus and William Addison Dwiggins ' Electra were both released with obliques. Morison's Times New Roman typeface has a very traditional true italic in the style of the late eighteenth century, which he later wryly commented owed "more to Didot than dogma". Some serif designs primarily intended for headings rather than body text are not provided with an italic, Engravers and some releases of Cooper Black and Baskerville Old Style being common examples of this. In addition, computer programmes may generate an 'italic' style by simply slanting
2100-446: The form "author, year" in zoology, and "standard abbreviated author name" in botany. Thus in the examples above, the genus Canis would be cited in full as " Canis Linnaeus, 1758" (zoological usage), while Hibiscus , also first established by Linnaeus but in 1753, is simply " Hibiscus L." (botanical usage). Each genus should have a designated type , although in practice there is a backlog of older names without one. In zoology, this
2160-441: The former. The reader must find additional criteria to distinguish between these. Here, apart from using the attribute of italic–non-italic styles, the title also employs the attribute of capitalization. Citation styles in which book titles are italicised differ on how to deal with a book title within a book title; for example, MLA style specifies a switch back to roman type, whereas The Chicago Manual of Style (14.94) specifies
2220-727: The generic name (or its abbreviated form) still forms the leading portion of the scientific name, for example, Canis lupus lupus for the Eurasian wolf subspecies, or as a botanical example, Hibiscus arnottianus ssp. immaculatus . Also, as visible in the above examples, the Latinised portions of the scientific names of genera and their included species (and infraspecies, where applicable) are, by convention, written in italics . The scientific names of virus species are descriptive, not binomial in form, and may or may not incorporate an indication of their containing genus; for example,
2280-432: The idea that a newly defined genus should fulfill these three criteria to be descriptively useful: Moreover, genera should be composed of phylogenetic units of the same kind as other (analogous) genera. The term "genus" comes from Latin genus , a noun form cognate with gignere ('to bear; to give birth to'). The Swedish taxonomist Carl Linnaeus popularized its use in his 1753 Species Plantarum , but
2340-477: The influence from calligraphy , italics normally slant slightly to the right, like so . Different glyph shapes from roman type are usually used – another influence from calligraphy – and upper-case letters may have swashes , flourishes inspired by ornate calligraphy. Historically, italics were a distinct style of type used entirely separately from roman type , but they have come to be used in conjunction—most fonts now come with
2400-402: The inter-war period is the display face Koch Antiqua . With a partly oblique lower case, it also makes the italic capitals inline in the style of blackletter capitals in the larger sizes of the metal type. It was developed by Rudolph Koch, a type designer who had previously specialised in blackletter font design (which does not use italics); Walter Tracy described his design as "uninhibited by
2460-519: The italic font has the top of the letter leaning to the left, instead of leaning to the right. Some font families, such as Venus , Roemisch, Topografische Zahlentafel, include left leaning fonts and letters designed for German cartographic map production, even though they do not support Arabic characters. In the 1950s, Gholamhossein Mosahab invented the Iranic font style , a back-slanted italic form to go with
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2520-628: The largest component, with 23,236 ± 5,379 accepted genus names, of which 20,845 ± 4,494 are angiosperms (superclass Angiospermae). By comparison, the 2018 annual edition of the Catalogue of Life (estimated >90% complete, for extant species in the main) contains currently 175,363 "accepted" genus names for 1,744,204 living and 59,284 extinct species, also including genus names only (no species) for some groups. The number of species in genera varies considerably among taxonomic groups. For instance, among (non-avian) reptiles , which have about 1180 genera,
2580-466: The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a number of type foundries such as American Type Founders and Genzsch & Heyse offered serif typefaces with oblique rather than italic designs, especially display typefaces but these designs (such as Genzsch Antiqua) have mostly disappeared. An exception is American Type Founders' Bookman , offered in some releases with the oblique of its metal type version. An unusual example of an oblique font from
2640-439: The lizard genus Anolis has been suggested to be broken down into 8 or so different genera which would bring its ~400 species to smaller, more manageable subsets. Italic type In typography , italic type is a cursive font based on a stylised form of calligraphic handwriting . Along with blackletter and roman type , it served as one of the major typefaces in the history of Western typography . Owing to
2700-403: The most (>300) have only 1 species, ~360 have between 2 and 4 species, 260 have 5–10 species, ~200 have 11–50 species, and only 27 genera have more than 50 species. However, some insect genera such as the bee genera Lasioglossum and Andrena have over 1000 species each. The largest flowering plant genus, Astragalus , contains over 3,000 species. Which species are assigned to a genus
2760-428: The name could not be used for both. Johann Friedrich Blumenbach published the replacement name Ornithorhynchus in 1800. However, a genus in one kingdom is allowed to bear a scientific name that is in use as a generic name (or the name of a taxon in another rank) in a kingdom that is governed by a different nomenclature code. Names with the same form but applying to different taxa are called "homonyms". Although this
2820-427: The parenthetical is italicised (in which case roman type is preferred, as on the right of this example ). In The Elements of Typographic Style , however, it is argued that, since Italic delimiters are not historically correct, the upright versions should always be used, while paying close attention to kerning . In media where italicization is not possible, alternatives are used as substitutes: OpenType has
2880-463: The period following from the style of Niccolò de' Niccoli , possibly even Manutius' own. The first use in a complete volume was a 1501 edition of Virgil dedicated to Italy, although it had been briefly used in the frontispiece of a 1500 edition of Catherine of Siena 's letters. In 1501, Aldus wrote to his friend Scipio: We have printed, and are now publishing, the Satires of Juvenal and Persius in
2940-526: The provisions of the ICZN Code, e.g., incorrect original or subsequent spellings, names published only in a thesis, and generic names published after 1930 with no type species indicated. According to "Glossary" section of the zoological Code, suppressed names (per published "Opinions" of the International Commission of Zoological Nomenclature) remain available but cannot be used as the valid name for
3000-444: The regular style if they cannot find an italic or oblique style, though this may look awkward with serif fonts for which an italic is expected. Professional designers normally do not simply tilt fonts to generate obliques but make subtle corrections to correct the distorted curves this introduces. Many sans-serif families have oblique fonts labelled as italic, whether or not they include "true italic" characteristics. If something within
3060-549: The right-to-left direction of the script. Since italic styles clearly look different from regular (roman) styles, it is possible to have 'upright italic' designs that have a cursive style but remain upright. In Latin-script countries, upright italics are rare but are sometimes used in mathematics or in complex texts where a section of text already in italics needs a 'double italic' style to add emphasis to it. Donald Knuth 's Computer Modern has an alternate upright italic as an alternative to its standard italic, since its intended use
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#17330927104583120-623: The same type is used as in normal type, but slanted to the right: Oblique type (or slanted roman, sloped roman) is type that is slanted, but lacking cursive letterforms, with features like a non-descending f and double-storey a , unlike "true italics". Many sans-serif typefaces use oblique designs (sometimes called "sloped roman" styles) instead of italic ones; some have both italic and oblique variants. Type designers have described oblique type as less organic and calligraphic than italics, which in some situations may be preferred. Contemporary type designer Jeremy Tankard stated that he had avoided
3180-497: The specific name particular to the wolf. A botanical example would be Hibiscus arnottianus , a particular species of the genus Hibiscus native to Hawaii. The specific name is written in lower-case and may be followed by subspecies names in zoology or a variety of infraspecific names in botany . When the generic name is already known from context, it may be shortened to its initial letter, for example, C. lupus in place of Canis lupus . Where species are further subdivided,
3240-412: The standard format for a species name comprises the generic name, indicating the genus to which the species belongs, followed by the specific epithet, which (within that genus) is unique to the species. For example, the gray wolf 's scientific name is Canis lupus , with Canis ( Latin for 'dog') being the generic name shared by the wolf's close relatives and lupus (Latin for 'wolf') being
3300-404: The style of handwritten manuscripts of the period. The choice of using italic type, rather than the roman type in general use at the time, was apparently made to suggest informality in editions designed for leisure reading. Manutius' italic type was cut by his punchcutter Francesco Griffo (who later, following a dispute with Manutius, claimed to have conceived it). It replicated handwriting of
3360-403: The taxon is termed a synonym ; some authors also include unavailable names in lists of synonyms as well as available names, such as misspellings, names previously published without fulfilling all of the requirements of the relevant nomenclatural code, and rejected or suppressed names. A particular genus name may have zero to many synonyms, the latter case generally if the genus has been known for
3420-407: The traditions of roman and italic". The printing historian and artistic director Stanley Morison was for a time in the inter-war period interested in the oblique type style, which he felt stood out in text less than a true italic and should supersede it. He argued in his article Towards an Ideal Italic that serif book typefaces should have as the default sloped form an oblique and as a complement
3480-654: The use of quotation marks ( A Key to Whitehead's " Process and Reality " ). An alternative option is to switch to an 'upright italic' style if the typeface used has one; this is discussed below. Left-leaning italics are now rare in Latin script , where they are mostly used for the occasional attention-grabbing effect. They were once more common, however, being used for example in legal documents. They are more common in Arabic script. In certain Arabic fonts (e.g.: Adobe Arabic, Boutros Ads),
3540-566: The values quoted are the mean of "accepted" names alone (all "uncertain" names treated as unaccepted) and "accepted + uncertain" names (all "uncertain" names treated as accepted), with the associated range of uncertainty indicating these two extremes. Within Animalia, the largest phylum is Arthropoda , with 151,697 ± 33,160 accepted genus names, of which 114,387 ± 27,654 are insects (class Insecta). Within Plantae, Tracheophyta (vascular plants) make up
3600-429: The virus species " Salmonid herpesvirus 1 ", " Salmonid herpesvirus 2 " and " Salmonid herpesvirus 3 " are all within the genus Salmonivirus ; however, the genus to which the species with the formal names " Everglades virus " and " Ross River virus " are assigned is Alphavirus . As with scientific names at other ranks, in all groups other than viruses, names of genera may be cited with their authorities, typically in
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