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Table 1 Discrepancies between the use of species names in scientific publications and citations of the original authors.

From: The taxonomist - an endangered race. A practical proposal for its survival

Scientific species name, original author, number of citation

Common species name

Google scholar hits of publications using the species name

Google scholar hits of publications citing the original author(s) and description

ISISMweb of knowledge hits of publications citing the original author(s) and description

Model organisms

Escherichia coli (Migula, 1895) [39]

E. coli

ca. 1.640.000

ca. 58

-

Arabidopsis thaliana (Linnaeus, 1763)a [33]

Mouse-ear cress

ca. 232.000

19

-

Drosophila melanogaster Meigen, 1830 [32]

Fruit fly

ca. 352.000

ca. 200

-

Caenorhabditis elegans (Maupas, 1899) [58]

-

ca. 173.000

52

-

Mus musculus Linnaeus, 1758 [4]

House mouse

ca. 108.000

ca. 300*

-

Trichoplax adhaerens Schulze, 1883 [59]

-

ca. 719

ca. 70

-

Lycopoidoides moellendorffii (Hieronymus, 1902)a [60]

Spikemoss (Selaginella moellendorffii)

ca. 560

155**

-

Amphimedon queenslandica Hooper & van Soest, 2006 [61]

Sponge

ca. 335

9

7

Macrostomum lignano Ladurner et al., 2005 [62]

Flatworm

ca. 150

25

34

Invasive species

Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis Longcore et al., 1999 [63]

Chytrid fungus

ca. 2130

317

246

Boiga irregularis (Bechstein, 1802) [64]

Brown tree snake

ca. 1760

1

-

Eleutherodactylus coqui Thomas, 1966 [65]

Common Puerto Rican Coqui frog

ca. 1510

16

-

Cameraria ohridella Deschka & Dimic, 1986 [66]

Horse-chestnut leaf miner

ca. 1320

ca. 30

Journal not indexed

Prominent species

Tyrannosaurus rex Osborn, 1905 [67]

T. rex

ca. 5410

ca. 30

-

Metasequoia glyptostroboides Hu & Cheng, 1948 [68]

Dawn redwood

ca. 2510

53/58

-

Latimeria chalumnae Smith, 1939 [69]

West Indian Ocean coelacanth

ca. 2070

325

-

Homo floresiensis Brown et al. 2004 [70]

Flores man, nicknamed "hobbit"

ca. 1400

245

244

Varanus komodoensis Ouwens, 1912 [71]

Komodo dragon

ca. 1010

10

-

Recently described species

Euperipatoides kanangrensis Reid, 1996 [72]

Onychophora

1800

33

47

Cryptocorynetes haptodiscus Yager, 1987 [73]

Remipedia

296

121

24

Latimeria menadoensis Pouyaud, 1999 [74]

Indonesian coelacanth

ca. 235

11

23

  1. We compared hit results of online queries for species names used in publications listed by Google scholar and ISISM web of knowledge and those publications citing the original authors and descriptions. Full citations are given in the references section of this paper. Note that ISISM web includes only hits after 1945.
  2. a We have altered the abbreviated botanical format of the original author into the zoological format, which provides the author name in full length with the year of publication.
  3. * Citations refer to the different spellings of the author's name (i.e., Linné, von Linné, and Linnaeus) and the entire tenth edition.
  4. ** Citations refer to the whole series "Die Natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien (...)", which was published between 1887 and 1909 in numerous volumes.
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Frontiers in Zoology

ISSN: 1742-9994