In biology

Biology

Biology is a natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function, growth, origin, evolution, distribution, and taxonomy. Biology is a vast subject containing many subdivisions, topics, and disciplines...

, a subgenus is a taxonomic rank

Taxonomic rank

In biological classification, rank is the level in a taxonomic hierarchy. Examples of taxonomic ranks are species, genus, family, and class. Each rank subsumes under it a number of less general categories...

 directly below genus

Genus

In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...

.

In zoology

International Code of Zoological Nomenclature

The International Code of Zoological Nomenclature is a widely accepted convention in zoology that rules the formal scientific naming of organisms treated as animals...

, a subgeneric name can be used independently or included in a species name

Binomen

In zoological nomenclature, a binomen , is the two-part name of a species. The term was introduced in 1953, abolishing the previously used "binomial name" . A binomen consists of a generic name and a specific epithet...

, in parentheses, placed between the generic name and the specific epithet: e.g. the Tiger Cowry

Cowry

Cowry, also sometimes spelled cowrie, plural cowries, is the common name for a group of small to large sea snails, marine gastropod molluscs in the family Cypraeidae, the cowries...

of the Indo-Pacific, Cypraea (Cypraea) tigris Linnaeus, which belongs to the subgenus Cypraea of the genus Cypraea. However, it is not mandatory, or even customary, when giving the name of a species, to include the subgeneric name.