The Interim Register of Marine and Nonmarine Genera (IRMNG) is a taxonomic database which attempts to cover published genus names for all domains of life from 1758 in zoology (1753 in botany) up to the present, arranged in a single, internally consistent taxonomic hierarchy, for the benefit of

Biodiversity Informatics Biodiversity informatics is the application of informatics techniques to biodiversity information, such as taxonomy, biogeography or ecology. Modern computer techniques can yield new ways to view and analyze existing information, as well as predict ...

initiatives plus general users of biodiversity (taxonomic) information. In addition to containing over 490,000 published genus name instances as at March 2020 (also including subgeneric names in zoology), the database holds over 1.7 million species names (1.3 million listed as "accepted"), although this component of the data is not maintained in as current or complete state as the genus-level holdings. IRMNG can be queried online for access to the latest version of the dataset and is also made available as periodic snapshots or data dumps for import/upload into other systems as desired.

Description

IRMNG contains scientific names (only) of the

genera Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nomencla ...

, a subset of

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate ...

, and principal higher ranks of most plants, animals and other kingdoms, both living and extinct, within a standardized taxonomic hierarchy, with associated machine-readable information on habitat (e.g. marine/nonmarine) and extant/

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

status for the majority of entries. The database aspires to provide complete coverage of both accepted and unaccepted genus names across all kingdoms, with a subset only of species names included as a secondary activity. In its March 2020 release, IRMNG contained 492,620 genus names, of which 232,093 were listed as "accepted", 121,389 "unaccepted", 7,462 of "other" status i.e. interim unpublished, ''nomen dubium'', ''nomen nudum'', ''taxon inquirendum'' or temporary name, and 131,676 as "uncertain" (unassessed for taxonomic status at this time). The data originate from a range of (frequently domain-specific) print, online and database sources, including (among others) '' Nomenclator Zoologicus'' for animals and '' Index Nominum Genericorum'' for plants, and are reorganised into a common

data structure In computer science, a data structure is a data organization, management, and storage format that is usually chosen for efficient access to data. More precisely, a data structure is a collection of data values, the relationships among them, a ...

to support a variety of online queries, generation of individual taxon pages, and bulk data supply to other

biodiversity informatics Biodiversity informatics is the application of informatics techniques to biodiversity information, such as taxonomy, biogeography or ecology. Modern computer techniques can yield new ways to view and analyze existing information, as well as predict ...

projects. IRMNG content can be queried and displayed freely via the web, and download files of the data down to the taxonomic rank of genus as at specific dates are available in the Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A) format. The data include

homonym In linguistics, homonyms are words which are homographs (words that share the same spelling, regardless of pronunciation), or homophones ( equivocal words, that share the same pronunciation, regardless of spelling), or both. Using this definiti ...

s (with their authorities), including both available (validly published) and selected unavailable names. Estimates for "accepted names" as held at March 2020 are as follows, broken down by kingdom: Estimated accepted genus totals by kingdom - based on Rees et al 2020

Estimated accepted genus totals by kingdom - based on Rees et al 2020

Animalia Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms in the biological kingdom Animalia. With few exceptions, animals consume organic material, breathe oxygen, are able to move, can reproduce sexually, and go through an ontogenetic stage i ...

: 239,093 accepted genus names (± 55,350) *

Plantae Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all current definitions of Plantae excl ...

: 28,724 accepted genus names (± 7,721) *

Fungi A fungus ( : fungi or funguses) is any member of the group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds, as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as a kingdom, separately from ...

: 10,468 accepted genus names (± 182) * Chromista: 11,114 accepted genus names (± 1,268) *

Protozoa Protozoa (singular: protozoan or protozoon; alternative plural: protozoans) are a group of single-celled eukaryotes, either free-living or parasitic, that feed on organic matter such as other microorganisms or organic tissues and debris. His ...

: 3,109 accepted genus names (± 1,206) *

Bacteria Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one biological cell. They constitute a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria were am ...

: 3,433 accepted genus names (± 115) *

Archaea Archaea ( ; singular archaeon ) is a domain of single-celled organisms. These microorganisms lack cell nuclei and are therefore prokaryotes. Archaea were initially classified as bacteria, receiving the name archaebacteria (in the Archae ...

: 140 accepted genus names (± 0) *

Virus A virus is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses infect all life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea. Since Dmitri Ivanovsky' ...

es: 851 accepted genus names (± 0) The cited ranges of uncertainty arise because IRMNG lists "uncertain" names (not researched therein) in addition to known "accepted" names; 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.

Database location and hosting

IRMNG was initiated and designed by Australian biologist and data manager Tony Rees in 2006. For his work on this and other projects, GBIF awarded him the 2014 Ebbe Nielsen Prize. From 2006 to 2014 IRMNG was located at CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research, and was moved to the Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ) over the period 2014–2016; from 2016 onwards all releases have been available via its new website www.irmng.org which is hosted by VLIZ. VLIZ also hosts the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS), using a common infrastructure.

IRMNG usage

Content from IRMNG is used by several global Biodiversity Informatics projects including Open Tree of Life, the

Global Biodiversity Information Facility The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) is an international organisation that focuses on making scientific data on biodiversity available via the Internet using web services. The data are provided by many institutions from around th ...

(GBIF), and the

Encyclopedia of Life The ''Encyclopedia of Life'' (''EOL'') is a free, online encyclopedia intended to document all of the 1.9 million living species known to science. It is compiled from existing trusted databases curated by experts and with the assistance of n ...

(EOL), in addition to others including the

Atlas of Living Australia The Atlas of Living Australia (ALA) is an online repository of information about Australian plants, animals, and fungi. Development started in 2006. The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is an organisation sign ...

and the Global Names Architecture (GNA)'s ''Global Names Resolver''. From 2018 onwards, IRMNG data are also being used to populate the taxonomic hierarchy and provide generic names for a range of taxa in the areas of protists (kingdoms

and Chromista) and plant algae (

Charophyta Charophyta () is a group of freshwater green algae, called charophytes (), sometimes treated as a division, yet also as a superdivision or an unranked clade. The terrestrial plants, the Embryophyta emerged within Charophyta, possibly from ter ...

Chlorophyta Chlorophyta or Prasinophyta is a taxon of green algae informally called chlorophytes. The name is used in two very different senses, so care is needed to determine the use by a particular author. In older classification systems, it refers to a ...

Glaucophyta The glaucophytes, also known as glaucocystophytes or glaucocystids, are a small group of unicellular algae found in freshwater and moist terrestrial environments, less common today than they were during the Proterozoic. The stated number of speci ...

and

Rhodophyta Red algae, or Rhodophyta (, ; ), are one of the oldest groups of eukaryotic algae. The Rhodophyta also comprises one of the largest phyla of algae, containing over 7,000 currently recognized species with taxonomic revisions ongoing. The majority ...

) in the

Catalogue of Life The Catalogue of Life is an online database that provides an index of known species of animals, plants, fungi, and microorganisms. It was created in 2001 as a partnership between the global Species 2000 and the American Integrated Taxonomic In ...

References

External links

* {{Official website Taxonomy (biology) Online databases Internet properties established in 2006 Biodiversity databases Online taxonomy databases

Description

Database location and hosting

IRMNG usage

References

Further reading

External links