is a Japanese marine scientist and

ichthyologist Ichthyology is the branch of zoology devoted to the study of fish, including bony fish (Osteichthyes), cartilaginous fish (Chondrichthyes), and jawless fish (Agnatha). According to FishBase, 35,800 species of fish had been described as of March 2 ...

. He graduated from

Hokkaido University , or , is a public research university in Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan. Founded in 1918, it is the fifth-oldest government-authorised university in Japan and one of the former Imperial Universities. The university finds its roots in Sapporo A ...

with a BA in 1968 and with a PhD in 1972. He is

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...

of Marine Environment and Resources at the Marine Laboratory for Biodiversity. He specializes in

taxonomy image:Hierarchical clustering diagram.png, 280px, Generalized scheme of taxonomy Taxonomy is a practice and science concerned with classification or categorization. Typically, there are two parts to it: the development of an underlying scheme o ...

and evolution of

shark Sharks are a group of elasmobranch cartilaginous fish characterized by a ribless endoskeleton, dermal denticles, five to seven gill slits on each side, and pectoral fins that are not fused to the head. Modern sharks are classified within the ...

s, rays,

chimaera Chimaeras are Chondrichthyes, cartilaginous fish in the order (biology), order Chimaeriformes (), known informally as ghost sharks, rat fish (not to be confused with rattails), spookfish, or rabbit fish; the last two names are also applied to B ...

s, and

Lake Tanganyika Lake Tanganyika ( ; ) is an African Great Lakes, African Great Lake. It is the world's List of lakes by volume, second-largest freshwater lake by volume and the List of lakes by depth, second deepest, in both cases after Lake Baikal in Siberia. ...

n fish. He is the author of many articles and books on sharks and

fish A fish (: fish or fishes) is an aquatic animal, aquatic, Anamniotes, anamniotic, gill-bearing vertebrate animal with swimming fish fin, fins and craniate, a hard skull, but lacking limb (anatomy), limbs with digit (anatomy), digits. Fish can ...

. In 1995 he was put in charge of dissecting and preparing the 7th specimen of the very rare

megamouth shark The megamouth shark (''Megachasma pelagios'') is a species of deepwater shark. Rarely seen by Human, humans, it measures around long and is the smallest of the three extant taxon, extant filter-feeding sharks alongside the much larger whale sha ...

Research Field

New species described by Nakaya and colleagues

Family Scyliorhinidae (Cat sharks)

Whitebody catshark (''

Apristurus albisoma The white-bodied catshark (''Apristurus albisoma'') is a catshark of the family Pentanchidae, the deepwater catsharks. Description This shark is coloured whitish to light grey. Distribution This species is found in the western Pacific. T ...

'' Nakaya & Séret, 1999)

br /> Largehead catshark ('' Apristurus ampliceps'' Sasahara, Sato & Nakaya, 2008)
br /> Catshark ('' Apristurus aphyodes'' Nakaya & Stehmann, 1998)
br /> Southern catshark ('' Apristurus australis'' Sato, Nakaya & Yorozu, 2008)
br /> Shortbelly catshark ('' Apristurus breviventralis'' Kawauchi, Weigmann & Nakaya, 2014)
br /> Softbody catshark ('' Apristurus exsanguis'' Sato, Nakaya & Stewart, 1999)
br /> Garricki catshark ('' Apristurus garricki'' Sato, Stewart & Nakaya, 2013)
br /> Japanese catshark ('' Apristurus japonicus'' Nakaya, 1975

br /> Longhead catshark ('' Apristurus longicephalus'' Nakaya, 1975

br /> Black roughscale catshark ('' Apristurus melanoasper'' Iglésias, Nakaya & Stehmann, 2004)
br /> Broadfin sawtail catshark ('' Galeus nipponensis'' Nakaya, 1975)
br /> Izu cat shark ('' Scyliorhinus tokubee'' Shirai, Hagiwara & Nakaya, 1992)

Additional taxa described by him

*See :Taxa named by Kazuhiro Nakaya

External links

Hokkaido University
1945 births Living people Japanese ichthyologists Hokkaido University alumni Japanese science writers Japanese non-fiction writers Scientists from Chiba Prefecture {{japan-scientist-stub