Classification

• Suppose you had only 10 minutes to run into a supermarket to get what you needed. Could you do it? In most supermarkets this would be an easy task. You would probably head straight to the area where the items were located. But what if you had to shop for the same items in a market where things were randomly placed throughout the store. Where would you begin? You would have to search through a lot of things before you found what you needed! You could be there for a long time!

Classification – putting things into groups based on similar characteristics

Why Classify?

• • • Make sense out of a chaotic natural world Easier to find information Identify relationships

Biologist organize living things into categories • Taxonomy - the science of identifying and classifying organisms

We Use Classification Every Day!

• • • Classify our clothes – (hopefully they are not all mixed together in a big pile on your bedroom floor) Classify our dishes – spoons, forks, cups) (bowls, plates, Classify our food – (how did you know where to find the cereal this morning?)

• • • • • 1 group 2 groups 3 groups 4 groups 5 groups

Classifying

Early Classification

• • Aristotle – 4 th century B.C.

Classification based on – where animals lived

Land Water Air

Problems

• Some animals fit into more than one group

Early Classification

• • Carolus Linnaeus (Carl von Linne) - Swedish biologist in early 1700’s Classification based on – shape and structure “The father of modern taxonomy”

Carolus Linnaeus

Two important contributions

Hierarchical Classification

Binomial Nomenclature Grouping organisms Naming organisms

Hierarchical Classification – ranked from more general to more specific

More General More Specific

Kingdom Phylum Class Order Family Genus Species

At each level – the organisms become more closely related

Remembering Hierarchical Classification - mnemonics K ingdom

K ing

P hylum C lass O rder F amily G enus S pecies

P hillip C ame O ver F or G ood S oup

Practice using Hierarchical classification The more levels you share with others, the more you have in common

Practice using Hierarchical classification • Classify your closet into K,P,C,O,F,G,S

Naming Organisms

• Scientific name – a name that remains the same in the biological world Why not use common names?

• Names are often not physically accurate

Silverfish Seahorse

• Names differ in other countries/languages

Sweden - groda Africa - padda Russia - zhaba Italy - rana “FROG”

• Many names may apply to the same creature

Mt. Lion Puma Cougar

• One name may apply to several different creatures European robin American robin

Names are written in Latin

In the Middle Ages, Latin became the accepted language of the scholar and scientist

Why Latin?

•

Latin is a “dead” language

It is no longer spoken as a national or even regional language anywhere in the world. Because of this, Latin words do not change so the pure Latin is not be corrupted by developing slang words from it

“bruisecruise,” “shingrater,” and “stonesoup”

just some of the over 300 slang terms used to describe the same exact thing – crashing on a skateboard

Why Latin?

•

Latin need not be translated

No matter what language you speak, the Latin scientific name is left as it is instead of using the common name

Polynomial

• used many words to describe the organism

Catnip

"Nepeta floribus interrupte spicatus pendunculatis" (Nepeta with flowers in an interrupted pedunculated spike).

Honey bee

Apis, pubescens, thorace subgriseo, abdomine fusco, pedibus posticis glabris utrinque margine ciliates

12 words long!

Name for humans…

• “hairy on top, bare on the bottom of the walking surfaces, bipedal, eyes forward with binocular vision, opposable thumbs, no wings, no feathers, capable of rational thought and the capacity to love.”

Binomial nomenclature

• two part scientific name The scientific name for the Asian elephant is

Elephas maximus

Rules for writing scientific names

1. Use the genus and species Kingdom Phylum Class Order Family Genus Species

Elephas maximus

Rules for writing scientific names

2. Genus is first – It is always capitalized 3. Species is second – It is always lower case 4. Both words are italicized or underlined

Example

•

Ursus arctos or Ursus arctos

The Mushroom Coral

• • • • • •

Phylum Cnidaria Class Anthozoa Order Scleractinia Family Fungiidae Genus Fungia Species scutaria

Practice using binomial nomenclature

• Remember that binomial nomenclature is a two-name naming system…kind of like a first and a last name.

MaIia Kunde

individual or species The group I belong to or genus

Kunde malia

Kunde malia

Practice using binomial nomenclature

• Which of these names is written correctly in binomial nomenclature?

A. felis domesticus B. Felis Domesticus C. Felis domesticus D. felis Domesticus

What does a third name mean?

• Subspecies tiger species is Panthera tigris Bengal tiger is Panthera tigris tigris Siberian tiger is Panthera tigris altaica • Person who discovered it

Strigiphilus aris garylarsoni

Abbreviating

• • Use the Capital letter of the Genus Example: E. coli or T. rex

•

Heterotrophic Eubacteria

Cyanobacteria