Acipenser
Greater sturgeons Temporal range:
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Atlantic sturgeon (Acipenser oxyrinchus oxyrinchus) | |
Scientific classification ![]() | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Actinopterygii |
Order: | Acipenseriformes |
Family: | Acipenseridae |
Genus: | Acipenser Linnaeus, 1758 |
Type species | |
Acipenser sturio Linnaeus, 1758
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Species | |
17, see text | |
Synonyms[1] | |
List
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Acipenser is a genus of sturgeons. With traditionally 17 living species (others are only known from fossil remains), it is the most speciose genus in the order Acipenseriformes. They are native to freshwater and estuarine systems of Eurasia and North America, and most species are threatened.[2] Several species also known to enter near-shore marine environments in the Atlantic, Arctic and Pacific oceans.
This is an ancient genus, with fossil species known as far back as the Late Cretaceous. In fact, the fossils of two species (A. praeparatorum and A. amnisinferos) are known from mass mortality assemblages thought to immediately follow the Chicxulub impact, the beginning of the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event.[3]
Living species
[edit]Traditionally, there are 17 living species, though the genus is well understood to be paraphyletic, containing all sturgeons that do not belong to Huso, Scaphirhynchus, or Pseudoscaphirhynchus, with many species more closely related to the other three genera than they are to other species of Acipenser.[2] A 2025 study redefines Acipenser in the strict sense (sensu stricto) with only 3 species.[4] The following are all the species that were included in Acipenser, with the species retained within Acipenser sensu stricto marked with an asterisk (*):
- Acipenser baerii J. F. Brandt, 1869
- Acipenser baerii baerii J. F. Brandt, 1869 (Siberian sturgeon)
- Acipenser baerii baicalensis A. M. Nikolskii, 1896 (Baikal sturgeon)
- Acipenser baerii stenorrhynchus A. M. Nikolskii, 1896 (Yenisei sturgeon)
- Acipenser brevirostrum Lesueur, 1818 (Shortnose sturgeon)
- Acipenser dabryanus A. H. A. Duméril, 1869 (Yangtze sturgeon)
- Acipenser fulvescens Rafinesque, 1817 (Lake sturgeon)
- Acipenser gueldenstaedtii J. F. Brandt & Ratzeburg, 1833 (Russian sturgeon)
- Acipenser medirostris Ayres, 1854 (Green sturgeon)
- Acipenser mikadoi Hilgendorf, 1892 (Sakhalin sturgeon)
- Acipenser naccarii Bonaparte, 1836 (Adriatic sturgeon)
- Acipenser nudiventris Lovetsky, 1828 (Fringebarbel sturgeon)
- Acipenser oxyrinchus Mitchill, 1815 *
- Acipenser oxyrinchus desotoi Vladykov, 1955 (Gulf sturgeon) *
- Acipenser oxyrinchus oxyrinchus Mitchill, 1815 (Atlantic sturgeon) *
- Acipenser persicus Borodin, 1897 (Persian sturgeon)
- Acipenser ruthenus Linnaeus, 1758 (Sterlet, Sterlet sturgeon)
- Acipenser schrenckii J. F. Brandt, 1869 (Japanese sturgeon)
- Acipenser sinensis J. E. Gray, 1835 (Chinese sturgeon)
- Acipenser stellatus Pallas, 1771 (Starry sturgeon)
- Acipenser sturio Linnaeus, 1758 (European sea sturgeon) *
- Acipenser transmontanus J. Richardson, 1836 (White sturgeon)
Fossil species
[edit]There are 9 species known from fossil remains:[5]
- †Acipenser albertensis Lambe 1902
- †Acipenser amnisinferos Hilton & Grande 2022[3]
- †Acipenser eruciferus Cope, 1876
- Acipenser fulvescens Rafinesque, 1817 (also living)
- †Acipenser gigantissimus Nessov 1997
- †Acipenser molassicus Probst 1882
- †Acipenser praeparatorum Hilton & Grande 2022[3]
- †Acipenser ornatus Leidy 1873
- Acipenser oxyrinchus Mitchell 1815 (also living)
- †Acipenser tuberculosus Probst 1882
- †Acipenser toliapicus Agassiz 1844 ex Woodward 1889
References
[edit]- ^ "Acipenseridae" (PDF). Deeplyfish- fishes of the world. Archived from the original (PDF) on 18 September 2017. Retrieved 18 May 2017.
- ^ a b Froese, Rainer; Pauly, Daniel (eds.). "Species in genus Acipenser". FishBase. May 2019 version.
- ^ a b c Hilton, E. J.; Grande, L. (2022). "Late Cretaceous sturgeons (Acipenseridae) from North America, with two new species from the Tanis site in the Hell Creek Formation of North Dakota". Journal of Paleontology. 97: 1–29. doi:10.1017/jpa.2022.81.
- ^ Brownstein, Chase D.; Near, Thomas J. (2024). "Towards a phylogenetic taxonomy of sturgeons (Acipenseriformes: Acipenseridae)". Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural History. 66. doi:10.3374/014.066.0101. ISSN 2162-4135. Retrieved 26 April 2025.
- ^ "Fossilworks: Acipenser". fossilworks.org. Retrieved 17 December 2021.
External links
[edit]Data related to Acipenser at Wikispecies
Media related to Acipenser at Wikimedia Commons
The dictionary definition of acipenser at Wiktionary