A critical analysis of the Fragilaria vaucheriae complex (Bacillariophyta) in Europe

Abstract

The genus Fragilaria was originally described by Lyngbye in 1819, although it was only in 1927 that a typus generis was designated by Boyer (1927): Fragilaria pectinalis (O.F.Müller) Lyngbye. Williams & Round (1987), later refined and completed by Tuji & Williams (2006a), provided a detailed description for the genus. Almost all species, nowadays transferred to the genus Fragilaria, were originally described in the genus Synedra Ehrenberg in the nineteenth century. Only a handful of scientists worked on this group then, such as