Icthyological terminology.

[zazuarz]

Can someone help me out with some of these words.

Holotype
Paratype
Lectotype
Iconotype
"cleared and stained"
cf (con forma)
sp. aff

... to name a few. Thanks.

[hwchoy]

from an old message from HH:



As for cf. and aff., the former is used when you are not sure if the
species you refer to is different from a described species: e.g. I use
Hemibagrus cf. nemurus if I am not sure if the catfish I have is the
same species as H. nemurus. I tell people of this uncertainty by using
cf.

Aff. is used when I am reasonably sure that the species is
different. By using H. aff. nemurus, I am telling people that I have a
species that is NOT H. nemurus, but is closest to it.

[Stuporman]

Clearing and staining is a method of making the soft tissues transparent and the bones and cartilage visible. The former is achieved via enzyme digestion and the latter via tissue-specific dyes.

The standard method is to double stain for bone and cartilage using alizarin red (stains bones purplish red) and Alcian Blue (stains cartilage blue). An abbreviated version of the technique can be found here (http://www.uoguelph.ca/zoology/rush/zoo402www/Fall2003/staining.html).

[Stuporman]

Type definitions can be found here (http://www.amonline.net.au/fishes/about/types/typesoft.htm).

[zazuarz]

Thanks.
Some more : phylogeny, monophyly....

[budak]

budak tries: phylogeny refers to the evolutionary pathway taken by a species/genus, i.e. how it evolved, its plausible ancestors and closest living relatives... a group (family, genus...) is monophyletic if it is deemed to have descended from a single common ancestor..... as opposed to polyphely (a group or trait that descends from more than one ancestral group, e.g. the emergence of photosynthesis is thought to have arisen from separate bacterial lineages).

[Stuporman]

phylogeny refers to the evolutionary pathway taken by a species/genus

Phylogeny does not refer to the pathway, but rather the evolutionary relationships between and within taxonomic groups.