Systematics, Taxonomy, and Taxonomic Groups

Approximately 1.5 million species of plants, fungi, microorganisms, and animalshave been described (i.e., have been discovered) but most estimates suggest that there are at least 7 to 10 million. The scientific study of this diversity and the evolutionary relationships among the species is called systematics. Taxonomy, which deals with the identifiying, naming, and classifying of organisms, is an important component of systematics.

Names:

Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778)

Species Plantarum, 1753

Linnaeus ambitiously set out to describe all known plants, animals, and minerals in Species Plantarum. He used polynomials such as the following:

"Nepeta floribus interrupte spicatus peduncularis"

But in doing that, he wrote a single word in the margin which, when combined with the first word of the polynomial, formalized a two-word description, e.g., Nepeta cataria. This gave us a binomial system of nomenclature.

Current System:

Kingdom Fungi

Phylum (Division) Basidiomycota

Class Hymenomycetes

Order Agaricales

Family Agaricaceae

Genus Agaricus

Species bisporus

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Classification Schemes:

There are a variety of ways organisms might be classified, but we have used the following for much of our classification (some will have components of the other):

Artificial

Natural

Phenetic

Phylogenetic
monophyletic vs polyphyletic