LABORATORY ACTIVITY 1 | 2.
Plants
INTRODUCTION TO TAXONOMY AND
NOMENCLATURE NTRODUCTION
Taxonomy
- Scientists believe all life as we know
it has evolved from a common
ancestor. This ancestor, often known by
the term LUCA (last universal common
ancestor), was believed to be alive
around 3.5 billion years ago. Since this
point, life has become varied through
evolution to the wide and beautiful array
of life we see all over the planet.
- Nobody knows exactly how many
different species exist on Earth. We
have discovered just around 1.3 million
species, but scientists predict that there
are several million more
out there that we haven’t discovered
yet. New species are constantly being
discovered
and added to the ever-growing list. It
has been a huge challenge for scientists
to catalog and organize these different
organisms.
- The classifying of organisms is
known as taxonomy. The system most
used is based on the characteristics of
living things and this taxonomy was
first formalized by Carl von Linné
(Carolus Linnaeus) in the eighteenth
century. The system involves sorting
living things into groups and breaking
those groups into multiple subgroups.
The largest groups of life are domains,
of which there are three:
1. Bacteria
- Are all around us but are difficult to see
without a microscope
2. Archaea
- Are unicellular organisms that are the
only life able to survive in the most
extreme conditions
3. Eukarya
- Have a cellular nucleus in common and
are what we typically think of as “life”
The three domains are then broken
down into kingdoms. There are six
kingdoms that all have distinct
characteristics:
1. Animals
3. Fungi
4. Protists
5. Bacteria
6. Archaea
• Bacteria and archaea are considered
both domains and kingdoms
• The eukarya domain contains the other
kingdoms; animals, plants, fungi, and
protista
These kingdoms are then split into phyla
groups (singular: phylum).
- Phyla are then divided further into
classes.
- Classes are then broken down into
smaller groups known as orders.
- Orders are broken down into
families; Within families, there are
subgroups known as genera (singular:
genus).
- Finally, the genera are split into
categories known as species; The
definition of species is a group of
organisms that can reproduce and
make fertile offspring. Depending on
certain groups (e.g. plants), secondary
ranks such as tribe, section, series,
variety, and form are also used.
Here is an example of the classification
table:
Domain Eukarya
Kingdom Animalia
Phylum Platyhelminthes
Class Acentrosomata
Order Cyclophyllidea
Genus Taenia
T. solium (Goeze, 1782)
Nomenclature
The format for writing scientific
names of animals is standardized
and internationally
accepted. “Scientific nomenclature”
refers to various names according to a
specific field
of study. Usually, animals are
identified by common and scientific
names.
 Taxonomists have established several o An example is Helicobacter pylori.
“codes” for scientific nomenclature. Helico- refers to the bacteria's spiral-
These codes are universal and are shaped rod while pylori refer to the
periodically updated by consensus. entrance to the duodenum where the
bacteria are located.
The protocol for naming species was
invented in the 1700s by Carl von Linné
(Carolus Linnaeus).
- He created the system of “binomial
nomenclature,” which uses only two
designations–genus and specific
epithet as the species name. In the
mid-1800s, scientists agreed on an
expanded system of nomenclature.
To date, the following are different
codes of nomenclature:
a. International Code of Nomenclature for
algae, fungi, and plants,
b. International Code of Nomenclature for
Cultivated Plants,
c. International Code of Zoological
Nomenclature (ICZN) and
d. International Code of Nomenclature of
Prokaryotes (ICNP).

The binomial name consists of a genus

name and a specific epithet.
1. The scientific names of species are
italicized. The genus name is always
capitalized and is written first
2. The specific epithet follows the genus
name and is not capitalized.
3. There is no exception to this.
4. You might also see a scientific name
followed by an initial or abbreviation.
This would denote the person who
discovered or named the species.
o For example, in Taenia solium G., the G
(not italicized) refers to the original
name given by the scientist, Goeze
o In some instances, “spp.” is an LABORATORY ACTIVITY 2 | TAXONOMIC KEY
abbreviation for “several species” (“sp” CONSTRUCTION
is the designation for one species) in the
genus. For example, Taenia spp. INTRODUCTION
Taxonomic key
Etymology of Plant and Animal
- is a device that helps biologists to
Invertebrate Species
identify an unknown organism. It is a
- Generic and scientific names of plant properly constructed key that consists of
and animal species have their origin important or “key” information regarding
or etymology. the species.
- This can be descriptive based on
their morphology.
- A user should go through the key
carefully and choose the best-fit
description of the specimen and move
into the next description.
There are three types of taxonomic keys:
(a) Dichotomous keys,
• the most popular tool that consists of
paired statements. It allows the user to
determine the identity of items using a
sequence of alternative choices.
• Dichotomous comes from the Greek
root dich-, meaning "two" and
temnein, meaning "to cut."
Dichotomous keys always give two,
mutually exclusive choices in parallel
statements. The pair of statements is
referred to as a couplet and each 1/2
of a couplet is a lead.
• At each couplet of a dichotomous
key the user is presented with two
choices about a specific character
present in the group of organisms, a
specific character state is described for
each lead. Sometimes the characters are
quantitative (i.e., measurements) and
sometimes the characters are
qualitative (e.g., texture).
• As the user makes a choice about a
particular characteristic of an organism
s/he is led to a new branch or couplet of
the key. Each couplet provides
characteristics that become
progressively more specific until the final
step is reached and identification is
made.
• Followed correctly, keys will lead you
to the correct name of an unknown
organism or object. Dichotomous keys
can be developed to identify anything in
any sort of classification.
(b) Multi-access
keys,
• Polycave or multi-access keys which
identify unknown objects or species. The
keys are generated using interactive
computer programs.
• Use a process of elimination.
• The user is presented with a series
of choices that describe features of
the species they wish to identify.
• The user then checks off a list of
character states present in the
organism they wish to study.
• The program looks to match those
character states with all the species
they can possibly match.
• If a species does not have that
character state it is eliminated from
the list.
• The more character states listed the
more species that are eliminated.
This allows the rapid elimination of
• large numbers of species that the
specimen cannot be. The process
continues until only one species (or a
short list of species) remains.
• This allows the user to eliminate lots of
potential species and identify the
species or at least a short list of possible
species. This continues until only one
species
• is left. If all went well, and the key fits
your group of organisms, that is the
name of the species you have located!
• Even the best keys have their limitations,
so make sure you verify your
identification
• using multiple tools (image verification,
herbarium specimens, expert
identification, etc.).
(b) Bayesian keys
• Are like multi-access keys, but the
• identification is based on how many
characters match. The more characters that
match, the more likely the specimen is to
be a particular species.
• This method is based on Bayesian
statistics, a branch of statistics that
specializes in predictions from limited prior
knowledge.
• One advantage is that, if there are a few
species of similar probability being
considered, they can all be shown and
easily compared.