THE VALIDITY OF THE NAME DISCOMYCES FOR THE 

 GENUS OF FUNGI VARIOUSLY CALLED ACTINO- 

 MYCES, STREPTOTHRIX, AND NOCARDIA 



By E. D. Merrill and H. W. Wade 



(From the Botanical and Bacteriological Sections of the Biological Labora- 

 tory, Bureau of Science, Manila) 



The nomenclature of the group of fungi the pathogenic mem- 

 bers of which produce the various actinomycoses, so-called, has 

 been the subject of a confusion that resulted from an unusual 

 combination of circumstances. For some time it was a moot 

 question whether the organisms were of bacterial or of fungous 

 nature, in part because of erroneous conceptions of their mor- 

 phology, which is complex and variable, and differs widely in 

 different strains; even yet opinions differ as to whether or not 

 the forms involved should be included in a single genus. One 

 of the types,' a saprophyte, Streptothrix foersteri Cohn, was for 

 a time erroneously included in a genus of the higher bacteria, 

 while the first pathogenic species described, Actinomyces bovis 

 Harz, having be5n recognized as a fungus, was given a different 

 generic name. The question was further complicated by the 

 fact that both names had long before been employed for entirely 

 different organisms. Since then some authors have held one 

 invalid, some the other, and some have rejected both. Other 

 names have been misapplied from time to time, while new ones 

 have been proposed, the list now including a total of ten. 



As is too frequently the case, the systematist and the pathol- 

 ogist have tended to ignore the work and the viewpoint of one 

 another. Medical writers, who almost exclusively have been con- 

 cerned with the study of these organisms and consequently the 

 use of their names, have been very prone to choose these from 

 the viewpoint of convenience and local custom rather than to 

 recognize and adhere to the rules of nomenclature by which 

 modern biologists are bound. On the other hand, botanists have 

 overlooked or ignored — and they still do this — names and de- 

 scriptions that have, in sincerity but without the formality cus- 

 tomary with themselves, been published by medical writers. It 

 is to consider the matter from both viewpoints in an effort to 

 determine the actually correct designation that we have collabor- 

 ated in a review of the vicissitudes of nomenclature that this 



group has undergone. 



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