Meaning & use
Osteichthyes
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Meaning
proper nounproperbiologytechnical
The scientific name for the group of fish with skeletons made of bone, which includes most familiar fish such as trout and tuna.
Grammar: Capitalized and treated as a name: Osteichthyes is a large group.
Patterns
- members of Osteichthyes
Salmon, cod and goldfish all belong to Osteichthyes.
Osteichthyes is far larger than the group containing sharks.
The student drew a family tree showing how Osteichthyes branched.
Common combinations
- class Osteichthyes
- Fish in class Osteichthyes have bony skeletons.
- belong to Osteichthyes
- Most freshwater fish belong to Osteichthyes.
- Osteichthyes and Chondrichthyes
- The textbook compares Osteichthyes and Chondrichthyes.
- evolution of Osteichthyes
- The evolution of Osteichthyes is traced in fossils.
- species of Osteichthyes
- There are thousands of species of Osteichthyes.
Synonyms and how they differ
- bony fish
- Bony fish is the plain English name used in everyday speech for the same group.
- teleosts
- Teleosts are the largest subgroup of bony fish, so the word is narrower than Osteichthyes.
Opposites
Word family
- osteo- prefix
- relating to bone
- ichthyology noun
- the study of fish
- ichthyologist noun
- a scientist who studies fish
- Chondrichthyes proper noun
- the group of cartilage-skeleton fish such as sharks
Commonly confused: Osteichthyes or Chondrichthyes?
Osteichthyes vs Chondrichthyes
Chondrichthyes has skeletons of cartilage, like sharks and rays, while Osteichthyes has bony skeletons.
Practice
Which animal belongs to Osteichthyes?
Choose one answer.
Salmon is a bony fish. Sharks and rays have cartilage skeletons, and a jellyfish is not a fish.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “Osteichthyes”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.