Ruan van Mazijk
Teaching Biodiversity for
FET Life Sciences
MSc candidate
Dept. Biological Sciences, UCT
Biodiversity,
evolution &
taxonomy
Chironia sp., Bobejaanskloof, 2018-05-24, CC BY 4.0 Ruan van Mazijk
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Ernst Haeckel’s Tree of Life
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The Tree of Life
– Discovering all its branches
– Understanding how those branches link together
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Why study life’s diversity?
– For its own sake
– For the benefit of society
– For medicines, materials & food
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Taxonomy
The science of classifying & naming organisms
– Foundation of all other life sciences
– Can’t do much without knowing what something is…
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Old-timey taxonomy: Linnaeus
Carl von Linné
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Old-timey taxonomy: Linnaeus cont.
– Pre-evolutionary
– Classification based on sexual parts for plants ()
– A lot of Linnaeus’ Systema Naturae & Systema
Plantarum didn’t hold up to modern scientific
evidence…
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But, he gave us 2x amazing (& simple!) things:
– Hierarchical classification
– Binomial nomenclature
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Naming things: Nomenclature
– A unique name for every species
– Common-names led to confusion…
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One of many plant species Linnaeus re-named
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Plantago foliis ovato-lanceolatus pubescentibus, spica
cylindrica, scapo tereti
(= “plantain with pubescent ovate-lanceolate leaves, a
cylindrical spike and a terete scape”)
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Plantago foliis ovato-lanceolatus pubescentibus, spica
cylindrica, scapo tereti
(= “plantain with pubescent ovate-lanceolate leaves, a
cylindrical spike and a terete scape”)
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Plantago media
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A mallard
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Classifying things: Hierarchies
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The domains
The 2x prokaryotic & 1x eukaryotic domains of the Tree of Life
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Proakryotes (simple life)
The bacteria species E. coli
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Proakryotes (simple life) cont.
An extremophilic archaean
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Eukaryotes (having a “true cell nucleus”)
The Kingdoms1 of eukaryotic life
1Protists are mostly algal micro-organisms that are neither plants,
fungi nor animals
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Kingdom Protista
Protists are the “dust-bin” kingdom
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Kingdom Fungi
Half animal, half plant
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Kingdom Animalia
Animals both big & small
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Animal phyla
A range of body-plans among animals
More-or-less increasing complexity
– Porifera
– Cnidaria
– Platyhelminthes
– Annelida
– Mollusca
– Nematoda
– Arthropoda
– Echinodermata
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Phylum Porifera
– Sea-sponges
– Colonial vs true organism?