HOW BACTERIA ARE NAMED AND IDENTIFIED 17 



generic name. A member of the genus Spironema may be termed a spironema 

 or a spironeme, a member of the genus Sireptomyces a streptomyces or a strepto- 

 mycete. 



7. A genus includes usually se\eral to many species; it is the name of a group 

 of species. The expression "The genus Salmonella is . . ." or ''Salmonella is . . ." 

 should always be preferred to such ambiguous phrases as "The Salmonella 

 ^roup is." 



In contrast to common, vernacular or casual names, the scientific name for 

 each kind of organism is planned to be the same in all countries and in all lan- 

 guages. When a correct scientific name is used, no question should arise in any 

 language as to what organism is intended. The names thus applied are supposed 

 to conform to certain general rules. 



International codes of nomenclature. In order that there be correct 

 scientific names, it is essential that there be international agreement as to the 

 rules governing their creation. Botanists and zoologists have met in numerous 

 international congresses in which delegates were accredited from the great 

 botanical and zoological societies, museums and educational institutions of the 

 world. Codes of nomenclature, designed to tell how names of taxa should be 

 published and to list the criteria of correctness, have been developed. These 

 codes or lists of rules and recommendations are quite similar in essentials for 

 botany and zoology, although they differ in some details. 



The question arose in bacteriology: Are either or both of these codes satis- 

 factory or adaptable to the use of microbiologists? Three views have been ex- 

 pressed by various writers. Some few suggested that the naming of bacteria 

 cannot well conform to the approved international rules as their classification 

 involves considerations not familiar to botanists and zoologists generally. The 

 second group insisted that unicellular forms of life are neither plants nor animals, 

 but Protista, and that taxonomic rules, etc., should be distinct for this group 

 and coordinate with the corresponding rules for plants and for animals. The third 

 view, more commonly expressed, was that the bacteria are sufficiently closely 

 related to the plants and animals so that (in so far as they apply) the interna- 

 tional agreements of the botanists (or zoologists) should be used as a basis for 

 naming them. 



International opinion on this topic was finally crystallized by resolutions 

 adopted by the First International Congress of the International Society for 

 Microbiology held in Paris in 1930. These resolutions, approved also by the ple- 

 nary session of the International Society for Microbiology, were in part as fol- 

 lows : 



"It is clearly recognized that the living forms with which the microbiologists 

 concern themselves are in part plants, in part animals, and in part primitive. It 

 is further recognized that in so far as they may he applicable and appropriate the 

 nomenclatural codes agreed upon by International Congresses of Botany and 

 Zoology should be followed in the naming of micro-organisms. Bearing in mind, 

 however, the peculiarly independent course of development that bacteriology 



