1.
Taxonomy (biology)
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Taxonomy is the science of defining groups of biological organisms on the basis of shared characteristics and giving names to those groups. The exact definition of taxonomy varies from source to source, but the core of the remains, the conception, naming. There is some disagreement as to whether biological nomenclature is considered a part of taxonomy, the broadest meaning of taxonomy is used here. The word taxonomy was introduced in 1813 by Candolle, in his Théorie élémentaire de la botanique, the term alpha taxonomy is primarily used today to refer to the discipline of finding, describing, and naming taxa, particularly species. In earlier literature, the term had a different meaning, referring to morphological taxonomy, ideals can, it may be said, never be completely realized. They have, however, a value of acting as permanent stimulants. Some of us please ourselves by thinking we are now groping in a beta taxonomy, turrill thus explicitly excludes from alpha taxonomy various areas of study that he includes within taxonomy as a whole, such as ecology, physiology, genetics, and cytology. He further excludes phylogenetic reconstruction from alpha taxonomy, thus, Ernst Mayr in 1968 defined beta taxonomy as the classification of ranks higher than species. This activity is what the term denotes, it is also referred to as beta taxonomy. How species should be defined in a group of organisms gives rise to practical and theoretical problems that are referred to as the species problem. The scientific work of deciding how to define species has been called microtaxonomy, by extension, macrotaxonomy is the study of groups at higher taxonomic ranks, from subgenus and above only, than species. While some descriptions of taxonomic history attempt to date taxonomy to ancient civilizations, earlier works were primarily descriptive, and focused on plants that were useful in agriculture or medicine. There are a number of stages in scientific thinking. Early taxonomy was based on criteria, the so-called artificial systems. Later came systems based on a complete consideration of the characteristics of taxa, referred to as natural systems, such as those of de Jussieu, de Candolle and Bentham. The publication of Charles Darwins Origin of Species led to new ways of thinking about classification based on evolutionary relationships and this was the concept of phyletic systems, from 1883 onwards. This approach was typified by those of Eichler and Engler, the advent of molecular genetics and statistical methodology allowed the creation of the modern era of phylogenetic systems based on cladistics, rather than morphology alone. Taxonomy has been called the worlds oldest profession, and naming and classifying our surroundings has likely been taking place as long as mankind has been able to communicate
2.
Plant
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Plants are mainly multicellular, predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. The term is generally limited to the green plants, which form an unranked clade Viridiplantae. This includes the plants, conifers and other gymnosperms, ferns, clubmosses, hornworts, liverworts, mosses and the green algae. Green plants have cell walls containing cellulose and obtain most of their energy from sunlight via photosynthesis by primary chloroplasts and their chloroplasts contain chlorophylls a and b, which gives them their green color. Some plants are parasitic and have lost the ability to produce amounts of chlorophyll or to photosynthesize. Plants are characterized by sexual reproduction and alternation of generations, although reproduction is also common. There are about 300–315 thousand species of plants, of which the great majority, green plants provide most of the worlds molecular oxygen and are the basis of most of Earths ecologies, especially on land. Plants that produce grains, fruits and vegetables form humankinds basic foodstuffs, Plants play many roles in culture. They are used as ornaments and, until recently and in variety, they have served as the source of most medicines. The scientific study of plants is known as botany, a branch of biology, Plants are one of the two groups into which all living things were traditionally divided, the other is animals. The division goes back at least as far as Aristotle, who distinguished between plants, which generally do not move, and animals, which often are mobile to catch their food. Much later, when Linnaeus created the basis of the system of scientific classification. Since then, it has become clear that the plant kingdom as originally defined included several unrelated groups, however, these organisms are still often considered plants, particularly in popular contexts. When the name Plantae or plant is applied to a group of organisms or taxon. The evolutionary history of plants is not yet settled. Those which have been called plants are in bold, the way in which the groups of green algae are combined and named varies considerably between authors. Algae comprise several different groups of organisms which produce energy through photosynthesis, most conspicuous among the algae are the seaweeds, multicellular algae that may roughly resemble land plants, but are classified among the brown, red and green algae. Each of these groups also includes various microscopic and single-celled organisms
3.
Flowering plant
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The flowering plants, also known as Angiospermae or Magnoliophyta, are the most diverse group of land plants, with 416 families, approx. 13,164 known genera and a total of c.295,383 known species, etymologically, angiosperm means a plant that produces seeds within an enclosure, in other words, a fruiting plant. The term angiosperm comes from the Greek composite word meaning enclosed seeds, the ancestors of flowering plants diverged from gymnosperms in the Triassic Period, during the range 245 to 202 million years ago, and the first flowering plants are known from 160 mya. They diversified extensively during the Lower Cretaceous, became widespread by 120 mya, angiosperms differ from other seed plants in several ways, described in the table. These distinguishing characteristics taken together have made the angiosperms the most diverse and numerous land plants, the amount and complexity of tissue-formation in flowering plants exceeds that of gymnosperms. The vascular bundles of the stem are arranged such that the xylem and phloem form concentric rings, in the dicotyledons, the bundles in the very young stem are arranged in an open ring, separating a central pith from an outer cortex. In each bundle, separating the xylem and phloem, is a layer of meristem or active formative tissue known as cambium, the soft phloem becomes crushed, but the hard wood persists and forms the bulk of the stem and branches of the woody perennial. Among the monocotyledons, the bundles are more numerous in the stem and are scattered through the ground tissue. They contain no cambium and once formed the stem increases in diameter only in exceptional cases, the characteristic feature of angiosperms is the flower. Flowers show remarkable variation in form and elaboration, and provide the most trustworthy external characteristics for establishing relationships among angiosperm species, the function of the flower is to ensure fertilization of the ovule and development of fruit containing seeds. The floral apparatus may arise terminally on a shoot or from the axil of a leaf, occasionally, as in violets, a flower arises singly in the axil of an ordinary foliage-leaf. There are two kinds of cells produced by flowers. Microspores, which divide to become pollen grains, are the male cells and are borne in the stamens. The female cells called megaspores, which divide to become the egg cell, are contained in the ovule. The flower may consist only of parts, as in willow. Usually, other structures are present and serve to protect the sporophylls, the individual members of these surrounding structures are known as sepals and petals. The outer series is usually green and leaf-like, and functions to protect the rest of the flower, the inner series is, in general, white or brightly colored, and is more delicate in structure. It functions to attract insect or bird pollinators, attraction is effected by color, scent, and nectar, which may be secreted in some part of the flower
4.
Eudicots
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The eudicots, Eudicotidae or eudicotyledons are a monophyletic clade of flowering plants that had been called tricolpates or non-magnoliid dicots by previous authors. The close relationships among flowering plants with tricolpate pollen grains was initially seen in studies of shared derived characters. These plants have a trait in their pollen grains of exhibiting three colpi or grooves paralleling the polar axis. Later molecular evidence confirmed the basis for the evolutionary relationships among flowering plants with tricolpate pollen grains. The term means true dicotyledons, as it contains the majority of plants that have been considered dicots and have characteristics of the dicots, the term eudicots has subsequently been widely adopted in botany to refer to one of the two largest clades of angiosperms, monocots being the other. The remaining angiosperms are sometimes referred to as basal angiosperms or paleodicots, the other name for the eudicots is tricolpates, a name which refers to the grooved structure of the pollen. Members of the group have tricolpate pollen, or forms derived from it and these pollens have three or more pores set in furrows called colpi. In contrast, most of the seed plants produce monosulcate pollen. The name tricolpates is preferred by some botanists to avoid confusion with the dicots, numerous familiar plants are eudicots, including many common food plants, trees, and ornamentals. Most leafy trees of midlatitudes also belong to eudicots, with exceptions being magnolias and tulip trees which belong to magnoliids, and Ginkgo biloba. The name eudicots is used in the APG system, of 1998 and it is applied to a clade, a monophyletic group, which includes most of the dicots. The eudicots can be divided into two groups, the basal eudicots and the core eudicots, basal eudicot is an informal name for a paraphyletic group. The core eudicots are a monophyletic group, a 2010 study suggested the core eudicots can be divided into two clades, Gunnerales and a clade called Pentapetalae, comprising all the remaining core eudicots
5.
Asterids
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In the APG IV system for the classification of flowering plants, the name asterids denotes a clade. Most of the taxa belonging to this clade had been referred to the Asteridae in the Cronquist system, the name asterids resembles the earlier botanical name but is intended to be the name of a clade rather than a formal ranked name, in the sense of the ICBN. The phylogenetic tree presented hereafter has been proposed by the APG IV project, genetic analysis carried out after APG II maintains that the sister to all other asterids are the Cornales. A second order that split from the base of the asterids are the Ericales, the remaining orders cluster into two clades, the lamiids and the campanulids. The structure of both of these clades has changed in APG III, in APG III system, the following clades were renamed, euasterids I → lamiids euasterids II → campanulids Asterids in Stevens, P. F. Angiosperm Phylogeny Website
6.
Ericales
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The Ericales are a large and diverse order of dicotyledons, including, for example, tea, persimmon, blueberry, Brazil nut, and azalea. The order includes trees, bushes, lianas, and herbaceous plants, together with ordinary autophytic plants, the Ericales include chlorophyll-deficient mycoheterotrophic plants and carnivorous plants. Many species have five petals, often grown together, fusion of the petals as a trait was traditionally used to place the order in the subclass Sympetalae. Mycorrhiza is a property, frequently associated with the Ericales. Indeed, symbiosis with fungi is quite common among the order representatives. In addition, some families among the order are notable for their ability to accumulate aluminum. Areas of distribution of families vary largely - while some are restricted to tropics, the entire order contains over 8,000 species, of which the Ericaceae account for 2, 000-4,000 species. The most commercially used plant in the order is tea from the Theaceae family, the order also includes some edible fruits, including kiwifruit, persimmon, blueberry, huckleberry, cranberry, Brazil nut, and Mamey sapote. The order also includes shea, which is the dietary lipid source for millions of sub-Saharan Africans. Many Ericales species are cultivated for their flowers, well-known examples are azalea, rhododendron, camellia, heather, polyanthus, cyclamen, phlox. These families are typical of newer classifications and those marked with an asterisk are recognized in the APG III system. Analyse des Familles de Plantes, avec lindication des principaux genres qui sy rattachent,28, S. Jansen, T. Watanabe, P. Caris, K. Geuten, F. Lens, N. Pyck, E. Smets. The Distribution and Phylogeny of Aluminium Accumulating Plants in the Ericales, W. S. Judd, C. S. Campbell, E. A. Kellogg, P. F. Stevens, M. J. Donoghue. Plant Systematics, A Phylogenetic Approach, 2nd edition, in, Nature Encyclopedia of Life Sciences. Arne A. Anderberg, Bertil Stahl, Mari Kallersjo, maesaceae, a New Primuloid Family in the Order Ericales s. l
7.
Actinidiaceae
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The Actinidiaceae are a small family of flowering plants commonly known as the Chinese gooseberry family. The family has three genera and about 360 species and is a member of the order Ericales and they are temperate and subtropical woody vines, shrubs, and trees, native to Asia and Central America and South America. Saurauia, with its 300 species, is the largest genus in this family, although now confined to Asia and tropical Central and South America, evidence indicates in the past the family had a wider distribution. The now extinct genus Parasaurauia is thought to have belonged to the Actinidiaceae, the plants are usually small trees or shrubs, or sometimes vines. The alternate, simple, spiral leaves have serrated or entire margins and they lack stipules or are minutely stipulated. They are often beset with rather flattened bristles, the flowers grow solitary or are aggregated in terminal cymes, with free sepals and petals. Except for members of the genus Clematoclethra which have 10 stamens and they invert just before the flower starts expanding, so their bases become apical. The plants may be dioecious, monoecious, or hermaphroditic, the fruit is usually a berry, such as the edible kiwifruit, a cultivar from the genus Actinidia. Before genetic evidence appeared in the last 10 years, the placement of the Actinidiaceae within the Ericales was highly controversial, the USDA Plants Database, a resource considered authoritative, still places the Actinidaceae within the Theales, an order which has been shown not to be monophyletic. Placement of the Actinidiaceae within the Ericales has been supported recently by genetic evidence. Further genetic evidence points to the Actinidiaceae being sister to the Roridulaceae, with the Roridulaceae and Sarraceniaceae, forming another, smaller, what genera were to be placed in the Actinidiaceae before recent genetic and micromophological studies emerged was highly controversial. Before recent evidence, the genus Sladenia was often placed within the Actinidiaceae, also, Saurauia was sometimes considered its own family. Thus, before more detailed studies started, two to four genera could be placed within the Actinidiaceae, micromorphological characters have confirmed that Sladenia does not belong in the Actinidiaceae. Actinidiaceae in L. Watson and M. J. Dallwitz, http, //delta-intkey. com Theales Order in the USDA Plants Database
8.
Actinidia
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The genus includes shrubs growing to 6 m tall, and vigorous, strong-growing vines, growing up to 30 m in tree canopies. They mostly tolerate temperatures down to around −15°C, and some are much hardier, the leaves are alternate and simple, with a dentated margin and a long petiole. The flowers are solitary or in cymes, usually white. Most of the species are dioecious with male and female plants. The fruit is a berry containing numerous small seeds, in most species. In particular, this genus is known for the species Actinidia deliciosa, the kiwifruit or Chinese gooseberry, Actinidia macrofossils have been recovered from the late Zanclean stage of Pliocene sites in Pocapaglia, Italy. Some species are grown as ornamental plants, notably A. kolomikta, in Japan, Actinidia polygama is noted for having an effect on cats much like that of catnip. It is mentioned in the saying 猫にまたたび、女郎に小判, meaning to put someone in a good mood by providing that which they most desire, a. kolomikta is the hardiest species, and has distinctive white- and pink-variegated foliage even on wild plants, an unusual phenomenon. Its fruit is small, weighing 8 g or less
9.
Binomial nomenclature
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Such a name is called a binomial name, a binomen, binominal name or a scientific name, more informally it is also called a Latin name. The first part of the name identifies the genus to which the species belongs, for example, humans belong to the genus Homo and within this genus to the species Homo sapiens. The formal introduction of system of naming species is credited to Carl Linnaeus. But Gaspard Bauhin, in as early as 1623, had introduced in his book Pinax theatri botanici many names of genera that were adopted by Linnaeus. Although the general principles underlying binomial nomenclature are common to these two codes, there are differences, both in the terminology they use and in their precise rules. Similarly, both parts are italicized when a binomial name occurs in normal text, thus the binomial name of the annual phlox is now written as Phlox drummondii. In scientific works, the authority for a name is usually given, at least when it is first mentioned. In zoology Patella vulgata Linnaeus,1758, the original name given by Linnaeus was Fringilla domestica, the parentheses indicate that the species is now considered to belong in a different genus. The ICZN does not require that the name of the person who changed the genus be given, nor the date on which the change was made, in botany Amaranthus retroflexus L. – L. is the standard abbreviation used in botany for Linnaeus. – Linnaeus first named this bluebell species Scilla italica, Rothmaler transferred it to the genus Hyacinthoides, the ICN does not require that the dates of either publication be specified. Prior to the adoption of the binomial system of naming species. Together they formed a system of polynomial nomenclature and these names had two separate functions. First, to designate or label the species, and second, to be a diagnosis or description, such polynomial names may sometimes look like binomials, but are significantly different. For example, Gerards herbal describes various kinds of spiderwort, The first is called Phalangium ramosum, Branched Spiderwort, is aptly termed Phalangium Ephemerum Virginianum, Soon-Fading Spiderwort of Virginia. The Latin phrases are short descriptions, rather than identifying labels, the Bauhins, in particular Caspar Bauhin, took some important steps towards the binomial system, by pruning the Latin descriptions, in many cases to two words. The adoption by biologists of a system of binomial nomenclature is due to Swedish botanist and physician Carl von Linné. It was in his 1753 Species Plantarum that he first began using a one-word trivial name together with a generic name in a system of binomial nomenclature. This trivial name is what is now known as an epithet or specific name
