🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

The landmark synthesis that re-anchored modern felid taxonomy. A 16-member IUCN Cat Specialist Group task force reviewed morphological, molecular, biogeographic, and behavioral evidence across all liv…

Kitchener AC, Breitenmoser-Wursten C, Eizirik E, et al. · Cat News Special Issue 11 · 2017

The sequencing of cat genomes, beginning with the domestic cat and extending to tiger, lion, snow leopard, cheetah, and others, transformed felid systematics. This overview surveys how whole-genome da…

Integrative taxonomy combines independent data classes (morphology, mitochondrial and nuclear DNA, ecology, biogeography, and behavior) to delimit taxa, and it has become the standard for resolving ca…

A recurring complication in felid systematics is that trees built from mitochondrial DNA often disagree with those from nuclear DNA. This overview explains why: the maternally inherited mitochondrion…

The history of cat classification is largely a story of tension and eventual integration between morphological and molecular approaches. This overview compares the two: morphology, including skull mor…

Molecular phylogenetics partitions all living cats into eight monophyletic lineages, a framework that now organizes felid taxonomy. This overview names and characterizes them: the Panthera lineage (bi…

The perennial tension between lumpers, who favor fewer broad taxa, and splitters, who recognize many fine ones, is sharply visible in cat classification. This overview examines how the debate plays ou…

This overview explains the reasoning the Cat Classification Task Force used to justify a major revision rather than incremental edits. It describes the decision rules adopted: recognize taxa only when…

Subspecies inflation, the naming of many weakly supported geographic forms, has long plagued large carnivore taxonomy and complicates conservation. This overview explains how cats accumulated dozens o…

Modern classifications divide living cats into two subfamilies: Pantherinae (the roaring and big cats plus clouded leopards) and Felinae (most small and medium cats). This overview explains how that s…

Cat classification is not merely academic; it directly shapes how cats are protected. This overview explains how taxonomy underlies Red List assessments, CITES appendices, and national legislation, al…

This influential study reconstructed the molecular phylogeny of all living cat species and dated their diversification, establishing the framework of eight major felid lineages used ever since. Using…

Johnson WE, Eizirik E, Pecon-Slattery J, et al. · Science · 2006