Danaphryne
genus of fishes
Danaphryne is a monospecific genus of marine ray-finned fish belonging to the family Oneirodidae, the dreamers, a family of deep sea anglerfishes. The only species in the genus is Danaphryne nigrifilis which is found in the tropical and temperate regions of all of the world's oceans.
Taxonomy
Danaphryne was first proposed as a monospecific genus in 1939 by the Danish ichthyologist Erik Bertelsen with Dolopichthys nigrifilis as its type species. Dolopichthys nigrifilis was first formally described in 1932 by the British ichthyologists Charles Tate Regan and Ethelwynn Trewavas with its type locality given as the South China Sea at 19°18.5'N, 120°13'E, the Dana station 3716 from a depth of around 1,500 m (4,900 ft). The 5th edition of Fishes of the World classifies this taxon in the family Oneirodidae in the suborder Ceratioidei of the anglerfish order Lophiiformes.
Etymology
Danaphryne combines Dana, the name of the Danish fisheries research vessel Dana from which the type was collected, with phryne, a suffix commonly used in the names of anglerfish genera. Its use for these fishes may date as far back as Aristotle and Cicero, who referred to anglerfishes as "fishing-frogs" and "sea-frogs", respectively, possibly because of their resemblance to frogs and toads. The specific name, nigrifillis means "black thread", referring to the pair filaments on the bulb of the esca which are, thick, tapering and are black with white tips.
Description
Danaphryne has between 5 and 7 soft rays in its dorsal fin and 4 or 5 soft rays in its anal fin. The metamorphosed females are distinguished form other taxa within the family Oneirodidae by having a narrow snout, vomerine teeth and a large, almost circular nasal foramen.
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Datasets, specimens, observations and peer-reviewed methods provide the appropriate test for the technical claims summarized here. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2168465. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1939 and 1932.
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This entry incorporates text from “Danaphryne” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.