Definition of "genus"

genus

/ˈdʒiːnəs/

noun
plural genera or (both nonstandard) genuses or genusses
1. (biology, taxonomy) A category in the classification of organisms, ranking below family (Lat. familia) and above species.
  Quotations
  Müller […] criticized the division of the "Jubuleae" into two families and he cited Jubula as an annectant genus.
  1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, New York, N.Y.: Columbia University Press, page 6
  1. A taxon at this rank.
2. A group with common attributes.
  Quotations
  Recollection is one of a whole genus of effects which are more or less peculiar to the phenomena that we naturally call "mental."
  1945, Bertrand Russell, A History of Western Philosophy, page 655
3. (topology, graph theory, algebraic geometry) A natural number representing any of several related measures of the complexity of a given manifold or graph.
4. (semantics) Within a definition, a broader category of the defined concept.
5. (music) A type of tuning or intonation, used within an Ancient Greek tetrachord.