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Myctophum nitidulum

Pearly lanternfish

Speciesaccepted · checked 2026-08-05WoRMS 126626ITIS 162726GBIF 2405852key worms:126626
i

2026-08-05: itis_id 162726 via WoRMS external link

Myctophum nitidulum, common name pearly lanternfish, is a species of deep sea fish in the family Myctophidae, the "lanternfish".W CalCOFI holds 1,272 observations of it in 2 datasets between 1951 and 2023, as larva.R

1,272
observations
1,272
records
1,272
sampling events
1951–2023
years
2
datasets
larva
life stages
8.3 cm
max length
Photograph of Myctophum nitidulum
Photo · Unknown author, no known copyright restrictions (public domain) · Public domain · inat

Observed in 2 datasets
i

One row per dataset, and beside it one cell per year, darker with more observations — the same strip the front door draws per dataset. Each row ends with the name that dataset uses (dataset_taxon); the accepted name is written once, in the title above. A quiet pill marks a name the authority does not accept.

  • 1,270 obs1,270 events1951–2023larva
    name used: Myctophum nitidulum Pearly lanternfish · code 273
  • 2 obs2 events2010–2011
    name used: Myctophum nitidulum · code Myctophum nitidulum

Ways inExplorerdb-queryERDDAPRPythonThis page as JSON

Code and endpoints ERDDAP · R · Python · JSON
ERDDAPCalCOFI's own server, the Ichthyoplankton table constrained to this taxon
https://erddap.calcofi.io/erddap/tabledap/swfsc_ichthyo.html?&taxon_key=%22worms:126626%22

Read from taxa.json of release v2026.10.20, written at release by calcofi4db::build_taxa_catalog(). The catalog's index is /species/.

How big is it 8.3 cm max · flexion 6.5–7 mm
Pearly lanternfish8.3 cm
US quarter2.4 cm

max · worms_attribute

Every mark is a measured length with its own source — hover one to read it. The reference objects are _data/size_reference.csv: two of them, the 505 µm bongo mesh and the net's ring, are CalCOFI's own sampling gear.

Life stages larva
  • Ichthyoplankton larva

The stages each dataset records for it, from the release's obs_bio.life_stage. Their lengths are under How big is it.

Lineage 13 ranks · Biota to Myctophum
Credits silhouette · photo · text · length
  • Silhouette · T. Michael Keesey · Public Domain Mark · PhyloPic, drawn from Myctophum punctatum · source
  • Photo · Unknown author, no known copyright restrictions (public domain) · Public domain · inat · source
  • Text · Wikipedia, “Myctophum nitidulum” · CC BY-SA 4.0 · revision 1355331430
  • Length · worms_attribute
Elsewhere Wikidata · iNaturalist · FishBase

WikidataiNaturalistFishBase

The same organism on the services the faces were fetched from; the authorities' own pages are the ids in the head.

Cite the release, v2026.10.20

Cite the release, v2026.10.20; each dataset's own citation, licence and DOI are on its page. How to cite ↗