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.
Animal
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Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms of the kingdom Animalia. The animal kingdom emerged as a clade within Apoikozoa as the group to the choanoflagellates. Animals are motile, meaning they can move spontaneously and independently at some point in their lives and their body plan eventually becomes fixed as they develop, although some undergo a process of metamorphosis later in their lives. All animals are heterotrophs, they must ingest other organisms or their products for sustenance, most known animal phyla appeared in the fossil record as marine species during the Cambrian explosion, about 542 million years ago. Animals can be divided broadly into vertebrates and invertebrates, vertebrates have a backbone or spine, and amount to less than five percent of all described animal species. They include fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals, the remaining animals are the invertebrates, which lack a backbone. These include molluscs, arthropods, annelids, nematodes, flatworms, cnidarians, ctenophores, the study of animals is called zoology. The word animal comes from the Latin animalis, meaning having breath, the biological definition of the word refers to all members of the kingdom Animalia, encompassing creatures as diverse as sponges, jellyfish, insects, and humans. Aristotle divided the world between animals and plants, and this was followed by Carl Linnaeus, in the first hierarchical classification. In Linnaeuss original scheme, the animals were one of three kingdoms, divided into the classes of Vermes, Insecta, Pisces, Amphibia, Aves, and Mammalia. Since then the last four have all been subsumed into a single phylum, in 1874, Ernst Haeckel divided the animal kingdom into two subkingdoms, Metazoa and Protozoa. The protozoa were later moved to the kingdom Protista, leaving only the metazoa, thus Metazoa is now considered a synonym of Animalia. Animals have several characteristics that set apart from other living things. Animals are eukaryotic and multicellular, which separates them from bacteria and they are heterotrophic, generally digesting food in an internal chamber, which separates them from plants and algae. They are also distinguished from plants, algae, and fungi by lacking cell walls. All animals are motile, if only at life stages. In most animals, embryos pass through a stage, which is a characteristic exclusive to animals. With a few exceptions, most notably the sponges and Placozoa and these include muscles, which are able to contract and control locomotion, and nerve tissues, which send and process signals
3.
Chordate
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Chordates are deuterostomes, as during the embryo development stage the anus forms before the mouth. They are also bilaterally symmetric coelomates, in the case of vertebrate chordates, the notochord is usually replaced by a vertebral column during development, and they may have body plans organized via segmentation. There are also additional extinct taxa, the Vertebrata are sometimes considered as a subgroup of the clade Craniata, consisting of chordates with a skull, the Craniata and Tunicata compose the clade Olfactores. Of the more than 65,000 living species of chordates, the worlds largest and fastest animals, the blue whale and peregrine falcon respectively, are chordates, as are humans. Fossil chordates are known from at least as early as the Cambrian explosion, Hemichordata, which includes the acorn worms, has been presented as a fourth chordate subphylum, but it now is usually treated as a separate phylum. The Hemichordata, along with the Echinodermata, form the Ambulacraria, the Chordata and Ambulacraria form the superphylum Deuterostomia, composed of the deuterostomes. Attempts to work out the relationships of the chordates have produced several hypotheses. All of the earliest chordate fossils have found in the Early Cambrian Chengjiang fauna. Because the fossil record of early chordates is poor, only molecular phylogenetics offers a prospect of dating their emergence. However, the use of molecular phylogenetics for dating evolutionary transitions is controversial and it has also proved difficult to produce a detailed classification within the living chordates. Attempts to produce family trees shows that many of the traditional classes are paraphyletic. While this has been known since the 19th century, an insistence on only monophyletic taxa has resulted in vertebrate classification being in a state of flux. Although the name Chordata is attributed to William Bateson, it was already in prevalent use by 1880, ernst Haeckel described a taxon comprising tunicates, cephalochordates, and vertebrates in 1866. Though he used the German vernacular form, it is allowed under the ICZN code because of its subsequent latinization, among the vertebrate sub-group of chordates the notochord develops into the spine, and in wholly aquatic species this helps the animal to swim by flexing its tail. In fish and other vertebrates, this develops into the spinal cord, the pharynx is the part of the throat immediately behind the mouth. In fish, the slits are modified to form gills, a muscular tail that extends backwards behind the anus. This is a groove in the wall of the pharynx. In filter-feeding species it produces mucus to gather food particles, which helps in transporting food to the esophagus and it also stores iodine, and may be a precursor of the vertebrate thyroid gland
4.
Mammal
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Mammals are any vertebrates within the class Mammalia, a clade of endothermic amniotes distinguished from reptiles by the possession of a neocortex, hair, three middle ear bones and mammary glands. All female mammals nurse their young with milk, secreted from the mammary glands, Mammals include the largest animals on the planet, the great whales. The basic body type is a quadruped, but some mammals are adapted for life at sea, in the air, in trees. The largest group of mammals, the placentals, have a placenta, Mammals range in size from the 30–40 mm bumblebee bat to the 30-meter blue whale. With the exception of the five species of monotreme, all modern mammals give birth to live young, most mammals, including the six most species-rich orders, belong to the placental group. The largest orders are the rodents, bats and Soricomorpha, the next three biggest orders, depending on the biological classification scheme used, are the Primates, the Cetartiodactyla, and the Carnivora. Living mammals are divided into the Yinotheria and Theriiformes There are around 5450 species of mammal, in some classifications, extant mammals are divided into two subclasses, the Prototheria, that is, the order Monotremata, and the Theria, or the infraclasses Metatheria and Eutheria. The marsupials constitute the group of the Metatheria, and include all living metatherians as well as many extinct ones. Much of the changes reflect the advances of cladistic analysis and molecular genetics, findings from molecular genetics, for example, have prompted adopting new groups, such as the Afrotheria, and abandoning traditional groups, such as the Insectivora. The mammals represent the only living Synapsida, which together with the Sauropsida form the Amniota clade, the early synapsid mammalian ancestors were sphenacodont pelycosaurs, a group that produced the non-mammalian Dimetrodon. At the end of the Carboniferous period, this group diverged from the line that led to todays reptiles. Some mammals are intelligent, with some possessing large brains, self-awareness, Mammals can communicate and vocalize in several different ways, including the production of ultrasound, scent-marking, alarm signals, singing, and echolocation. Mammals can organize themselves into fission-fusion societies, harems, and hierarchies, most mammals are polygynous, but some can be monogamous or polyandrous. They provided, and continue to provide, power for transport and agriculture, as well as commodities such as meat, dairy products, wool. Mammals are hunted or raced for sport, and are used as model organisms in science, Mammals have been depicted in art since Palaeolithic times, and appear in literature, film, mythology, and religion. Defaunation of mammals is primarily driven by anthropogenic factors, such as poaching and habitat destruction, Mammal classification has been through several iterations since Carl Linnaeus initially defined the class. No classification system is accepted, McKenna & Bell and Wilson & Reader provide useful recent compendiums. Though field work gradually made Simpsons classification outdated, it remains the closest thing to a classification of mammals
5.
Primate
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A primate is a mammal of the order Primates. In taxonomy, primates include two distinct lineages, strepsirrhines and haplorhines, Primates arose from ancestors that lived in the trees of tropical forests, many primate characteristics represent adaptations to life in this challenging three-dimensional environment. Most primate species remain at least partly arboreal, with the exception of humans, who inhabit every continent except for Antarctica, most primates live in tropical or subtropical regions of the Americas, Africa and Asia. Based on fossil evidence, the earliest known true primates, represented by the genus Teilhardina, an early close primate relative known from abundant remains is the Late Paleocene Plesiadapis, c. Molecular clock studies suggest that the branch may be even older. The order Primates was traditionally divided into two groupings, prosimians and anthropoids. Prosimians have characteristics more like those of the earliest primates, and include the lemurs of Madagascar, lorisoids, simians include monkeys, apes and hominins. Simians are divided into two groups, catarrhine monkeys and apes of Africa and Southeast Asia and platyrrhine or New World monkeys of South, catarrhines consist of Old World monkeys, gibbons and great apes, New World monkeys include the capuchin, howler and squirrel monkeys. Humans are the only extant catarrhines to have spread successfully outside of Africa, South Asia, New primate species are still being discovered. More than 25 species were described in the decade of the 2000s. Considered generalist mammals, primates exhibit a range of characteristics. Some primates are primarily terrestrial rather than arboreal, but all species possess adaptations for climbing trees, locomotion techniques used include leaping from tree to tree, walking on two or four limbs, knuckle-walking, and swinging between branches of trees. Primates are characterized by large brains relative to other mammals, as well as a reliance on stereoscopic vision at the expense of smell. These features are developed in monkeys and apes and noticeably less so in lorises. Three-color vision has developed in some primates, most also have opposable thumbs and some have prehensile tails. Many species are dimorphic, differences include body mass, canine tooth size. Primates have slower rates of development than other similarly sized mammals and reach maturity later, depending on the species, adults may live in solitude, in mated pairs, or in groups of up to hundreds of members. The relationships among the different groups of primates were not clearly understood until relatively recently, for example, ape has been used either as an alternative for monkey or for any tailless, relatively human-like primate
6.
Strepsirrhini
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Collectively they are referred to as strepsirrhines. Adapiforms are sometimes referred to as being lemur-like, although the diversity of both lemurs and adapiforms does not support this comparison, today, Strepsirrhini excludes the tarsiers, which are now grouped in the other major primate suborder, Haplorhini, along with the monkeys and apes. Strepsirrhines are often referred to as living fossils. Instead, they have evolved for millions of years under natural selection, some of their traits may be derived from ancestral primates, while others are unique to strepsirrhines. Strepsirrhines are defined by their wet nose or rhinarium and they also have a smaller brain than comparably sized simians, large olfactory lobes for smell, a vomeronasal organ to detect pheromones, and a bicornuate uterus with an epitheliochorial placenta. Their eyes contain a layer to improve their night vision, and their eye sockets include a ring of bone around the eye. Strepsirrhine primates produce their own vitamin C, whereas haplorhine primates must obtain it from their diets, lemuriform primates are characterized by a toothcomb, a specialized set of teeth in the front, lower part of the mouth mostly used for combing fur during grooming. Often, the toothcomb is used to characterize all strepsirrhines. Instead, it is unique to lemuriforms and is not seen among adapiforms, lemuriforms groom orally, and also possess a grooming claw on the second toe of each foot for scratching in areas that are inaccessible to the mouth and tongue. It is unclear whether adapiforms possessed grooming claws, the taxonomy of strepsirrhines is controversial and has a complicated history. Strepsirrhines diverged from the haplorhine primates near the beginning of the primate radiation between 55 and 90 mya, older divergence dates are based on genetic analysis estimates, while younger dates are based on the scarce fossil record. Lemuriform primates may have evolved from either cercamoniines or sivaladapids, both of which were adapiforms that may have originated in Asia and they were once thought to have evolved from adapids, a more specialized and younger branch of adapiform primarily from Europe. Lemurs rafted from Africa to Madagascar between 47 and 54 mya, whereas the split from the African galagos around 40 mya. Both living and extinct strepsirrhines are behaviorally diverse, although all are primarily arboreal, most living lemuriforms are nocturnal, while most extinct adapiforms were diurnal. Both living and extinct groups primarily fed on fruit, leaves, many of todays strepsirrhines are endangered due to habitat destruction, hunting for bushmeat, and live capture for the exotic pet trade. The taxonomic name Strepsirrhini derives from the Greek στρεψίς and ῥινός, the name was first used by French naturalist Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire in 1812 as a subordinal rank comparable to Platyrrhini and Catarrhini. In his description, he mentioned Les narines terminales et sinueuses, following Pocock, many researchers continued to spell Strepsirrhini with a single r until primatologists Paulina Jenkins and Prue Napier pointed out the error in 1987. Strepsirrhines include the extinct adapiforms and the primates, which include lemurs
7.
Sifaka
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Sifakas are a genus of lemur from the family Indriidae within the order Primates. The name of their family is an onomatopoeia of their characteristic shi-fak alarm call, like all lemurs, they are found only on the island of Madagascar. All species of sifakas are threatened, ranging from vulnerable to critically endangered, sifakas are medium-sized indrids with a head and body length of 40 to 55 centimetres and a weight of 3 to 6 kilograms. Their tail is just as long as their body, which differentiates them from the Indri and their fur is long and silky, with coloration varying by species from yellowish-white to black brown. The round, hairless face is always black, as with all lemurs, the sifaka has special adaptations for grooming, including a toilet-claw on its second toe and a toothcomb. Sifakas move by vertical clinging and leaping, meaning they maintain an upright position leaping from tree trunk to tree trunk and they are skillful climbers and powerful jumpers, able to make leaps of up to 10 m from one tree to the next. On the ground they move like all indrids with bipedal sideways hopping movements of the hind legs, sifakas are herbivores, eating leaves, flowers, and fruits. When not searching for food they spend a part of the day sunbathing. Sifakas live in groups than the other indrids. They have a territory, which they mark with scent glands. Edges of different sifaka territories can overlap, even though they defend their territory from invasion by others of their species, they may peacefully co-exist with other lemur species such as red-bellied lemur and the common brown lemur. Successful invasions are known to result in death of members, group takeover. Predators of the include the fossa, a puma-like mammal native to Madagascar. The sifaka usually avoids these attacks with its agile acrobatics through the high above the ground. However, they have known to attack by biting and scratching and have even been witnessed fighting off a boa constrictor. A four to five-month gestation period ends with the birth of a single offspring in July, the young holds fast to the mothers belly when small, but then later is carried on her back. Young are weaned after six months and reach full maturity at the age of two to three years. The life expectancy of the sifakas is up to 20 years, family Indriidae Genus Indri Genus Avahi Genus PropithecusP
8.
Endangered species
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An endangered species is a species which has been categorized as likely to become extinct. In 2012, the IUCN Red List featured 3079 animal and 2655 plant species as endangered worldwide, the figures for 1998 were, respectively,1102 and 1197. Many nations have laws that protect conservation-reliant species, for example, population numbers, trends and species conservation status can be found in the lists of organisms by population. The conservation status of a species indicates the likelihood that it will become extinct, the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species is the best-known worldwide conservation status listing and ranking system. Over 40% of the species are estimated to be at risk of extinction. Internationally,199 countries have signed an accord to create Biodiversity Action Plans that will protect endangered, in the United States, such plans are usually called Species Recovery Plans. Those species of Near Threatened and Least Concern status have been assessed and found to have relatively robust and healthy populations, though these may be in decline. The IUCN categories, with examples of animals classified by them, include, Extinct Extinct in the wild Captive individuals survive, critically endangered Faces an extremely high risk of extinction in the immediate future. Endangered Faces a high risk of extinction in the near future, vulnerable Faces a high risk of endangerment in the medium term. Near-threatened May be considered threatened in the near future, Least concern No immediate threat to species survival. A population size reduction of ≥ 50%, projected or suspected to be met within the next 10 years or three generations, whichever is the longer, based on any of to under A1. E) Quantitative analysis showing the probability of extinction in the wild is at least 20% within 20 years or five generations, there is data from the United States that shows a correlation between human populations and threatened and endangered species. Under the Endangered Species Act in the United States, species may be listed as endangered or threatened, the Salt Creek tiger beetle is an example of an endangered subspecies protected under the ESA. Some endangered species laws are controversial, also lobbying from hunters and various industries like the petroleum industry, construction industry, and logging, has been an obstacle in establishing endangered species laws. The Bush administration lifted a policy that required federal officials to consult an expert before taking actions that could damage endangered species. Under the Obama administration, this policy has been reinstated, being listed as an endangered species can have negative effect since it could make a species more desirable for collectors and poachers. This effect is potentially reducible, such as in China where commercially farmed turtles may be reducing some of the pressure to poach endangered species. Another problem with the species is its effect of inciting the use of the shoot, shovel
9.
Lemur
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Lemurs are a clade of strepsirrhine primates endemic to the island of Madagascar. As with other primates, such as lorises, pottos. In this regard, lemurs are often confused with ancestral primates, when in actuality, lemurs did not give rise to monkeys and apes, due to Madagascars highly seasonal climate, lemur evolution has produced a level of species diversity rivaling that of any other primate group. Until shortly after humans arrived on the island around 2,000 years ago, ranging in weight from the 30-gram mouse lemur to the 9-kilogram indri, lemurs share many common, basal primate traits, such as divergent digits on their hands and feet and nails instead of claws. However, their brain-to-body size ratio is smaller than that of anthropoid primates, lemurs are generally the most social of the strepsirrhine primates and communicate more with scents and vocalizations than with visual signals. Many lemur adaptations are in response to Madagascars highly seasonal environment, lemurs have relatively low basal metabolic rates and may exhibit seasonal breeding, dormancy, or female social dominance. Most eat a variety of fruits and leaves, while some are specialists. Although many share similar diets, different species of lemur share the same forests by differentiating niches, Lemur research during the 18th and 19th centuries focused on taxonomy and specimen collection. Although field observations trickled in from early explorers, modern studies of lemur ecology, initially hindered by political instability and turmoil on Madagascar during the mid-1970s, field studies resumed in the 1980s and have greatly increased the understanding of these primates. Research facilities like the Duke Lemur Center have provided research opportunities under more controlled settings, lemurs are important for research because their mix of ancestral characteristics and traits shared with anthropoid primates can yield insights on primate and human evolution. However, many species are threatened with extinction due to habitat loss. Although local traditions generally help protect lemurs and their forests, illegal logging, widespread poverty, Carl Linnaeus, the founder of modern binomial nomenclature, gave lemurs their name as early as 1758, when he used it in the 10th edition of Systema Naturae. He included three species under the genus Lemur, Lemur tardigradus, Lemur catta, and Lemur volans, although the term lemur was first intended for slender lorises, it was soon limited to the endemic Malagasy primates, which have been known as lemurs ever since. The name derives from the Latin term lemures, which refers to specters or ghosts that were exorcised during the Lemuria festival of ancient Rome, according to Linnaeus own explanation, the name was selected because of the nocturnal activity and slow movements of the slender loris. Being familiar with the works of Virgil and Ovid and seeing an analogy that fit with his naming scheme, Linnaeus adapted the term lemur for these nocturnal primates. However, Dunkel et al. noted in 2012 that it has been commonly and falsely assumed that Linnaeus was referring to the appearance, reflective eyes. Lemurs are primates belonging to the suborder Strepsirrhini, like other strepsirrhine primates, such as lorises, pottos, and galagos, they share ancestral traits with early primates. In this regard, lemurs are popularly confused with ancestral primates, however, lemurs did not give rise to monkeys, instead, they evolved independently in isolation on Madagascar
10.
Rainforest
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The monsoon trough, alternatively known as the intertropical convergence zone, plays a significant role in creating the climatic conditions necessary for the Earths tropical rainforests. Around 40% to 75% of all species are indigenous to the rainforests. It has been estimated there may be many millions of species of plants, insects. Tropical rainforests have been called the jewels of the Earth and the worlds largest pharmacy, the undergrowth in some areas of a rainforest can be restricted by poor penetration of sunlight to ground level. If the leaf canopy is destroyed or thinned, the ground beneath is soon colonized by a dense, tangled growth of vines, shrubs and small trees, the term jungle is also sometimes applied to tropical rainforests generally. Tropical rainforests are characterized by a warm and wet climate with no dry season. Mean monthly temperatures exceed 18 °C during all months of the year, average annual rainfall is no less than 168 cm and can exceed 1,000 cm although it typically lies between 175 cm and 200 cm. Many of the tropical forests are associated with the location of the monsoon trough. The broader category of tropical moist forests are located in the zone between the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn. Tropical forests have been called the Earths lungs, although it is now known that rainforests contribute little net oxygen addition to the atmosphere through photosynthesis, Tropical forests cover a large part of the globe, but temperate rainforests only occur in few regions around the world. Temperate rainforests are rainforests in temperate regions and they occur in North America, in Europe, in East Asia, in South America and also in Australia and New Zealand. A tropical rainforest typically has a number of layers, each with different plants, examples include the emergent, canopy, understorey and forest floor layers. They need to be able to withstand the hot temperatures and strong winds that occur above the canopy in some areas, eagles, butterflies, bats and certain monkeys inhabit this layer. The canopy layer contains the majority of the largest trees, typically 30 metres to 45 metres tall, the densest areas of biodiversity are found in the forest canopy, a more or less continuous cover of foliage formed by adjacent treetops. The canopy, by some estimates, is home to 50 percent of all plant species, epiphytic plants attach to trunks and branches, and obtain water and minerals from rain and debris that collects on the supporting plants. The fauna is similar to found in the emergent layer. A quarter of all species are believed to exist in the rainforest canopy. Scientists have long suspected the richness of the canopy as a habitat, true exploration of this habitat only began in the 1980s, when scientists developed methods to reach the canopy, such as firing ropes into the trees using crossbows
11.
Madagascar
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Madagascar, officially the Republic of Madagascar, and previously known as the Malagasy Republic, is an island country in the Indian Ocean, off the coast of Southeast Africa. The nation comprises the island of Madagascar, and numerous smaller peripheral islands, consequently, Madagascar is a biodiversity hotspot, over 90% of its wildlife is found nowhere else on Earth. The islands diverse ecosystems and unique wildlife are threatened by the encroachment of the growing human population. The first archaeological evidence for human foraging on Madagascar dates to 2000 BC, human settlement of Madagascar occurred between 350 BC and AD550 by Austronesian peoples arriving on outrigger canoes from Borneo. These were joined around AD1000 by Bantu migrants crossing the Mozambique Channel from East Africa, other groups continued to settle on Madagascar over time, each one making lasting contributions to Malagasy cultural life. The Malagasy ethnic group is divided into 18 or more sub-groups of which the largest are the Merina of the central highlands. Until the late 18th century, the island of Madagascar was ruled by an assortment of shifting sociopolitical alliances. Beginning in the early 19th century, most of the island was united and ruled as the Kingdom of Madagascar by a series of Merina nobles, the monarchy collapsed in 1897 when the island was absorbed into the French colonial empire, from which the island gained independence in 1960. The autonomous state of Madagascar has since undergone four major constitutional periods, since 1992, the nation has officially been governed as a constitutional democracy from its capital at Antananarivo. However, in an uprising in 2009, president Marc Ravalomanana was made to resign. Constitutional governance was restored in January 2014, when Hery Rajaonarimampianina was named president following a 2013 election deemed fair, Madagascar is a member of the United Nations, the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie and the Southern African Development Community. Madagascar belongs to the group of least developed countries, according to the United Nations, Malagasy and French are both official languages of the state. The majority of the population adheres to traditional beliefs, Christianity, ecotourism and agriculture, paired with greater investments in education, health, and private enterprise, are key elements of Madagascars development strategy. As of 2017, the economy has been weakened by the 2009-2013 political crisis, in the Malagasy language, the island of Madagascar is called Madagasikara and its people are referred to as Malagasy. The islands appellation Madagascar is not of origin, but rather was popularized in the Middle Ages by Europeans. On St. Laurences Day in 1500, Portuguese explorer Diogo Dias landed on the island, polos name was preferred and popularized on Renaissance maps. At 592,800 square kilometres, Madagascar is the worlds 47th largest country, the country lies mostly between latitudes 12°S and 26°S, and longitudes 43°E and 51°E. Neighboring islands include the French territory of Réunion and the country of Mauritius to the east, as well as the state of Comoros, the nearest mainland state is Mozambique, located to the west
12.
Snout
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A snout is the protruding portion of an animals face, consisting of its nose, mouth, and jaw. In many animals the equivalent structure is called a muzzle, rostrum or proboscis, the wet, naked surface around the nostrils of the nose of some animals is known as the rhinarium. The rhinarium is often associated with a sense of olfaction. The snout is considered a point on most animals, because of its structure. Snouts are found on other mammals in a variety of shapes. Some animals, including ursines and great cats, have box-like snouts, while others, pig snouts are flat and cylindrical. The muzzle begins at the stop, just below the eyes, in the domestic dog, most of the upper muzzle contains organs for detecting scents. The loose flaps of skin on the sides of the muzzle that hang to different lengths over the mouth are called flews. It is innervated by one of the pairs of cranial nerves. These nerves start in the brain and emerge through the skull to their target organs, other destinations of these nerves are eyeballs, teeth and tongue. The muzzle shape of a domestic dog ranges in shape depending upon the breed, from long and thin, as in the Rough Collie, to nearly nonexistent because it is so flat
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