Good points.  Three or more letter species species descriptor is fine.  the descriptor would be best differetn to decrease confusion.  Most people will prefer to use Ppa-xxx-p23 not -ppa23.  I will make this clearer.

On Friday, October 17, 2003, at 11:38 AM, Marie-Anne Felix wrote:

Dear Paul,

This nomenclature seems good to me. It looks a little heavy, but in fact it does not prevent a researcher who only works on Oscheius to keep writing dpy-1 on the plate.

Until now we have been using a prefix with 3 letters such as Ppa-lin-39. It seems to me that in the outside-the-worm literature, there are sometimes 2 (Hs, Mm, Dm) and sometimes 3 letters (Dme, Dsi) used? 2 will never be sufficient with millions of nematode species (and non-nematode species, but these are only few!) but 3 appears long to write.

Would the prefix in Ppa-lin-39 be necessarily the same as the species designation as in dpy-pp1? It might be easier to keep a single name for the two uses. Using at least two letters would then be necessary for the mutant (dpy-cb1 rather than just dpy-b1 for briggsae).

There could be an exception for Caenorhabditis species, however.

Note that there is now a (thin) Oscheius website at:
http://www.ijm.jussieu.fr/Oscheius_tipulae.htm
I'll change the gene nomenclature once it is decided.

Best,
Marie-Anne

--
Marie-Anne Felix
Institut Jacques Monod, Tour 43, 2 pl. Jussieu,
75251 Paris Cedex 05, France
Tel: +33-1-44-27-40-88; Fax: +33-1-44-27-52-65
(5e etage, couloir 42-43)
http://www.ijm.jussieu.fr/developpement_des_nematodes.php