—--- = spoken What Biosystematists Do

- Study the big picture

Lecture 1. The Science of Taxonomy and - Diversity of living organisms on
Systematics earth is the result of billions of years
of evolution
What is Taxonomy? - Seek to ensure that the classification of
- Mainly focus on describing, naming, and organisms, into genera, families, and higher
classifying organisms categories, is founded on evolutionary
relationships
What Taxonomists Do - Only in the light of evolution will all
- Discover, discern, describe, name, classify, this make sense
study, compare, and identify world’s living - Allow predictions about the properties
and extinct species and other taxa. and traits of organisms
- Document the living world - Important requirement for many
- Use a universal and internationally other branches of biology
accepted naming system, governed by a - No organ is perfect because
body of agreed rules, to ensure that taxon evolution tend to create variations
names are unambiguous and precise
- Make sure that knowledge and Paclitaxel
understanding of biodiversity is organized - Anti-cancer compound
and can be accessed. - Found in taxol plant

Systematics Conotoxin
- Study of the nature and origin of the - Anti-pain medicine
natural population of living organisms, both - Found in snail poison
present and past (Myers, 1952) - More powerful than morphine
- Production of cladograms that link taxa
through their observed variation Utility and utilitarianism only tend to lead to
- Conceptual and procedural relationships globalization or the unregulated consumption and
among and within areas of systematics commercialization of everything all in the effort to
satisfy the need of the large but very few
Triad: conglomerates, corporations, or companies at the
1. Taxonomy expense of environmental destruction and the
- Provides the names, the categories, livelihood of the few.
and the boxes where we put
organisms in Systematics and taxonomy, on a usefulness
utilitarian perspective, is a way to feed the world.
2. Study of the Process of Evolution
- Sources of variability Taxonomy and Systematics as a Useful Science
- Organization of genetic variability in 1. Feeding the World
populations - Taxonomy of pests and pathogens
- Differentiation of populations - Discovering biological control
- Reproductive isolation and the agents
origin of species - Documenting wild relatives of crop
- Hybridization plants and animals to discover
- Use as a way to differentiate genes that may improve yields or
different populations and to create resist disease
certain changes and speciation - Exploring the taxonomy of soil and
through reproductive isolation, aquatic microbes
natural selection, the origin of 2. Discovering the Drugs of the Future
species, hybridization of organism - Fifty percent (50%) of all
pharmaceutical compounds
3. Study of Phylogeny registered for use in the USA are
- Divergence and/or development of derived from, or were originally
all groups: discovered in living organisms
- Mode 3. Improving Human Health
- Time - Many disease-causing organisms
- Place have not yet been named or studied
- Use cladograms or the tree of life - Ecologists and farmers of the
human microbiome carefully
manipulate our internal biodiversity
 to cure diseases and keep us - Biogeochemical cycles are what
healthy make the world go round. It pertains
4. Enabling Industrial Innovation to the biotic, the living, and the
- Organisms that produce medicines, geological as well as the chemical
fuels, plastics, and other organic processes that happen in earth.
chemicals 5. Oceanography
5. Enabling Sustainability - By discovering and documenting
- By characterizing biodiversity, organisms, many of them
taxonomists and biosystematist microscopic and poorly studied, that
provide the framework and tools by underpin and drive ocean
which others can study change and productivity.
resilience of the Earth system in the 6. Climate Science
face of past, present and future - By enabling past, current, and future
stresses. climate change to be tracked,
through an understanding of their
Systematics and taxonomy are the forefronts or effects on species and ecological
the initial stages of sustainability. communities.
- Humans caused the 6th mass
If you don't know what you're protecting, then you extinction and we are in the current
can't protect it. Anthropocene period.
7. Agricultural Science
Threat from Human-Induced Environmental - By characterizing pests, diseases,
Change beneficial organisms, and the wild
- Global warming relatives of crop plants.
- Pollution 8. Medicine
- Extractive industries - By enabling deeper, more accurate
knowledge of the microbiome, i.e.
“Trying to manage the Earth sustainably without human pathogens and probiotics.
an adequate taxonomy is like trying to manage the 9. Environmental Science
world’s largest, most complex corporation without - By discriminating species and
an adequate inventory of stock and with no real supporting and understanding of life
idea of what most of the products look like or do.” histories and management of
natural resources and species stocks
Taxonomy and Systematics Support the Other 10. Conservation Science
Fields of Sciences - By providing the authoritative
1. Ecology species names that underpin
- By ensuring that species and other conservation planning and
taxa (subjects of most ecological legislation
studies) are scientifically robust,
well characterized, and can be The History and Science of Taxonomy
accurately identified ● 16th century
2. Genetics - Rise of botany and zoology as
- By providing the evolutionary and applied sciences
taxonomic framework that allows ○ Botany - study of medicinal herbs
an understanding of genetic ○ Zoology - study of the human
diversity and evolution anatomy and physiology
3. Geology ● 18th and 19th century
- By characterizing and documenting - Extensive botanical and zoological
the fossils that form the basis of taxonomy (identification)
much of stratigraphy and, hence, are
key to mining and oil and gas ● 19th century
exploration - Introduction of the theory of
- There are certain species that are evolution
key indicators of certain reserves. ○ Systematics - studied in universities
Oil reserves or minerals. ○ Taxonomy - (assigned in museums)
4. Earth Science ■ Geographic isolation
- By enabling documentation of ■ Biological species concept
biogeochemical cycles that help ■ Ecological and behavioral
stabilize and drive the Earth research
systems
Development of systematics and taxonomy took a
very long time. Developed from the prototype to
the mature type along the span of 24 centuries.
4th Century BC
- Golden Age of Greeks
- Plato, Aristotle, and Antioperastus
Renaissance
- France
- Salpino, Magno, Tu rei, Linnaeus (Father of
taxonomy)
1700s
- Anderson

19th Century
- Pre-Darwinian up to Darwinian
enlightenment
- Darwin and Wallace

Taxonomy
- Refers to the classification of organisms
- Branch of systematics
- Involved in the classification and naming of
organisms
- Does not deal with the evolutionary history
of organisms
- Can change with future studies

Systematics
- Refers to the study and classification of
organisms for the determination of the
evolutionary relationship of organisms
- Studies the relationship of organisms
- Involved in the classification, naming,
cladistics, and phylogenetics
- Deals with the evolutionary history of
organisms
- Does not change with future studies