wildlife Flashcards
classification
the action or process of classifying something according to shared qualities or characteristics.
taxonomy
the branch of science concerned with classification, especially of organisms; systematics
binomial nomenclature
the system of nomenclature in which two terms are used to denote a species of living organism, the first one indicating the genus and the second the specific epithet.
taxon
a taxonomic group of any rank, such as a species, family, or class.
genus
a principal taxonomic category that ranks above species and below family, and is denoted by a capitalized Latin name,
family
the scientific study of families and close interpersonal relationships
order
the arrangement or disposition of people or things in relation to each other according to a particular sequence, pattern, or method.
class
it is further divided into one or more orders. In the biological classification of organisms, a class is a major taxonomic rank below the phylum (or division) and above the order.
phylum
a principal taxonomic category that ranks above class and below kingdom.
division
a rank that if treated as a division of a genus or subgenus is deemed to be of subgeneric rank for the purposes of nomenclature.
kingdom
kingdom is a taxonomic rank that is composed of smaller groups called phyla
domain
Domain is the highest taxonomic rank in the hierarchical biological classification system, above the kingdom level. There are three domains of life, the Archaea, the Bacteria, and the Eucarya.
phylogeny
the branch of biology that deals with phylogenesis
characters
the mental and moral qualities distinctive to an individual.
molecular clock
The molecular clock is a figurative term for a technique that uses the mutation rate of biomolecules to deduce the time in prehistory when two or more life forms diverged. The biomolecular data used for such calculations are usually nucleotide sequences for DNA, RNA, or amino acid sequences for proteins.
