True and False Taxonomical Decisions on the genus Artemia Leach, 1819 (Anostraca: Artemiidae)
Alireza Asem1 ; Nasrullah Rastegar-Pouyani2*
1) Protectors of Urmia Lake National Park Society (NGO), Urmia, Iran
2) Department of Biology, Faculty of Sciences, Razi University, Kermanshah, IranSummary:
For the first time, the brine worm Artemia had been reported from the Urmia Lake in 982 by an unknown Iranian geographer. Schlösser draw its first picture in 1756. After that, it was named Cancer salinus Linnaeus 1758. In 1819 Leach corrected its taxonomical status and described the genus Artemia. Up to now seven species and sibling species of Artemia have been described from about 600 locations all over the world. Unfortunately after 1933, when economical importance of Artemia was appeared, basic researches stopped for 3-4 decades, specially taxonomical and biosystematical studies. During these years all populations of Artemia were introduced as Artemia salina, so now these old information are almost useless. Nowadays several researches are studying Artemia but there are some false taxonomical expressions. Trinomial nomenclature is used for sibling species of Artemia instead of binomial nomenclature. Furthermore, punctuations and nomenclatural rules aren't respected. Based on this study, taxonomical decisions on the genus Artemia should be revised according to the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature.
