How to Write a Scientific Name

Formatting a Name for Most Organisms

Write the genus name. Use an online scientific name finder, such as SciName Finder, to look up the genus of your organism. Underline or italicize the genus name, and capitalize the first letter. For example, let’s say you were writing the scientific name of the snake plant, a tropical plant native to West Africa. The genus name would be written Sansevieria or Sansevieria. Using the common name of your organism in an online search will yield the proper scientific name.

Write the specific epithet after the genus name. Look up the specific epithet (the species name) of your organism if you don’t know it yet. Underline or italicize the specific epithet, and put it in lowercase. The specific epithet of the snake plant would be written trifasciata or trifasciata.

Practice writing the scientific name. Write the full scientific name by placing the two italicized terms in the proper order with a space between them. You can also combine the underlined terms to make one word. For example, our snake plant’s full scientific name could be written Sansevieria trifasciata or Sansevieriatrifasciata.

Add names for mutations, if necessary. Determine if your organism has a special variety or cultivar. For cultivars, add the name of the cultivar, capitalized and in single quotes, after the specific epithet. Do not underline or italicize the cultivar name. For varieties, write “var.” after the epithet and underline or italicize the variety name. Capitalize a variety name only if it is a proper noun. For example, the scientific name of the Golden Hahnii snake plant, a new cultivar of the snake plant, would be written Sansevieria trifasciata ‘Golden Hahnii.’ The scientific name of the striped snake plant, a variety of the snake plant, would be written Sansevieria trifasciata var. Laurentii. The Laurentii is capitalized because it is a proper noun (a last name) in honor of the person who discovered the plant. Varieties are mutations that occur in nature, while cultivars are man-made mutations. For example, a new variety of a species might occur in a unique natural environment, such as a rainforest. On the other hand, a cultivar might develop in a greenhouse where humans are only breeding certain types of plants.

Using Scientific Names Properly

Write the scientific name in all caps in your title. Ignore the typical capitalization conventions of scientific naming when using the scientific name in your title of your paper. Use the same point font as the rest of the title, and write the scientific name in all caps. You can italicize or underline the name as normal or not, it’s up to you.

Make the scientific name unitalicized in a block of italic text. Set off the scientific name by removing italics when it appears in a block of italicized text. Though rare, if your underlined scientific name appears in a block of underlined text, remove the underlining to make it stand out.

Use the full scientific name on first reference for an academic audience. Abbreviate the generic name for subsequent references to the same organism in your paper or article. Preserve the formatting of your scientific name. For example, Sansevieria trifasciata would become S. trifasciata on future references. Most generic names are abbreviated with a capitalized first letter then a period. Search an online scientific name finder, such as SciName Finder, to confirm the abbreviation of your generic name. Several universities also have online databases to assist with scientific abbreviations.

Use the common name instead of the scientific name for the public. Use the common name of the organism in papers and lectures directed at the general public. This simpler approach ensures better compression of your subject for a lay audience. So rather than saying, “sansevieria trifasciata” in your talk to a Boy Scout troop, say, “snake plant.”