Interim Register of Marine and Nonmarine Genera
The Interim Register of Marine and Nonmarine Genera is a taxonomic database which attempts to cover published genus names for all domains of life, from 1758 in zoology up to the present, arranged in a single, internally consistent taxonomic hierarchy, for the benefit of Biodiversity Informatics initiatives plus general users of biodiversity information. In addition to containing over 500,000 published genus name instances as at July 2024, the database holds over 1.7 million species names, 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. The database was commenced in 2006 at the then CSIRO Division of Marine and Atmospheric Research in Australia and, since 2016, has been hosted at the Flanders Marine Institute in Belgium.
Description
IRMNG contains scientific names of the genera, a subset of species, 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 and extant/fossil 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. The names in IRMNG fall within the governance of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature for zoology, the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants for botany including those groups, the International Code of Nomenclature of Prokaryotes for Bacteria and Archaea, and the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses for that group.In its July 2024 release, IRMNG contained 508,851 genus names, of which 240,625 were listed as "accepted", 123,117 "unaccepted", 23,192 of "other" status i.e. interim unpublished, nomen dubium, nomen nudum, taxon inquirendum or temporary name, and 121,917 as "uncertain". The data originate from a range of print, online and database sources, including Nomenclator Zoologicus for animals and Index Nominum Genericorum for plants, and are reorganised into a common data structure to support a variety of online queries, generation of individual taxon pages, and bulk data supply to other biodiversity informatics 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 format. The data include homonyms, including both available and selected unavailable names.
Since in zoology names of subgenera are included, along with genera, in the "genus-group" and are deemed by the "principle of coordination" to have been simultaneously published at both ranks even if not explicitly so at the time of original publication, they are included as available generic names in the IRMNG compilation but marked as "unaccepted names" unless where they are currently in use as the accepted name for a genus. By contrast, the botanical Code, which covers Algae, Fungi and Plants, lacks such a provision, so subgenera published under that Code are not included in IRMNG except where they have been explicitly re-ranked to be botanical genera, in which case a new "name" is considered to have been created at that point with authorship given in the form of the original author of the subgenus in parentheses, followed by the name of the author responsible for the newly elevated status.
Estimates for "accepted names" as held at May 2023 are as follows, broken down by kingdom, following the methodology used in Rees et al., 2020 :
- Animalia: 189,287 accepted genus names plus notional 50% of 104,583 "uncertain" names: est. total 241,578 accepted genera
- Plantae: 25,394 accepted genus names plus notional 50% of 13,838 "uncertain" names: est. total 32,313 accepted genera
- Fungi: 10,702 accepted genus names plus notional 50% of 358 "uncertain" names: est. total 10,881 accepted genera
- Chromista: 9,912 accepted genus names plus notional 50% of 2,379 "uncertain" names: est. total 11,102 accepted genera
- Protozoa: 999 accepted genus names plus notional 50% of 2,164 "uncertain" names: est. total 2,081 accepted genera
- Bacteria: 3,337 accepted genus names plus notional 50% of 223 "uncertain" names: est. total 3,393 accepted genera
- Archaea: 140 accepted genus names
- Viruses: 851 accepted genus names