Biology - B1.1- classification

Keywords :
Heterotrophic - eats other things
autotropic - makes its own foods by photosythesis for example.
saprophyc- digests other organisms outside its cell body
unicellular - made of one cell, ( for example, bacterial cells)
multicellular- made of lots of cells ( for example, humans)

Classification - the five kingdoms are separated into ( in order) :

species ( groups of organisms that have things in common)
genus (several species with characteristics in common)
family ( composing of several different genera- genus)
order (composing of several different families)
class ( etc.)
phylum

Homosapien for example shows this, "Homo" is the species, "sapien" is the genus.

The reason for the latin name when giving a species of animal its correct name means that people from all over the world can understand it which allows for study and identification everywhere.

species that are at threat can be preserved more efficiently this way.

Five kingdoms

Animalia - animals are multicellular, they do not have cell walls ( they have cell membranes ) and they don't have chlorophyl. They therefore do not create their own food and so are heterotrophic, eating of other organisms.

plantae - all plants. they are multicellular, they have chlorophyl and have cell walls. They therefore feed autotrophically, producing their own food via photosynthesis.

Fungi- multicellular, they have cell walls but no chlorophyl. They feed saprophyically ( feeding off dead organisms and decaying material).

Protocisita - protocists are unicellular, they have a nucleus. For example, algae.

Prokaryotes - unicellular, have no nucleus. For example, bacteria.

Viruses are not counted into any of the five kingdoms as they cannot reproduce themselves, they only attack other cells, meaning that when the cell multiplies itself it multiplies the virus with it. They are smaller than bacteria, they have a protein coat containing only a few genes. They are non-living.

Vertabrates- have a rod supporting the running length of the body.

e.g. Humans( Homosapiens) have a spine to support the running length of our body.

Supported into five different classes- amphibians, fish, mammals, reptiles and birds.

These are placed into groups depending on

oxygen absorption - through lungs, gills, skin
reproduction- how do they reproduce? externally or internally? oviparious ( lays eggs) or viviparious (gives birth to live young- like us).
Thermoregulation- how do we control our internal temperature? homeotherms ('warm blooded' - kept at a constant temperature) or poikilotherms ('cold blooded' - changes with external temperature).

Therefore, in order to classify which groups to put the animal in you would look at keys like this, shown underneath, although many are difficult to classify as they may have more than one characteristic from each. If this happens it will be placed in the one that it is more like.

Variation in species may complicate an accurate classification, for example a bird of the same species may have a different coloured stripe on one side. It's still the same species, just with a stripe. Another thing that may complicate it is that hybrids in ducks may create a whole different species of duck, but also they might not be ( weird huh?) also, a group of the same species may be separated by an environmental factor such as mountains. On each side of these mountains the environment may be different and so the species will adapt differently, creating new characteristics and possibly, eventually creating a different species all together.

	Created by greenchloe1998 almost 10 years ago

A note page of everything within topic one A Chemistry, edexcel gcse. Work in progress so... <3 good luck guys.x If you scroll down there's also a bit on biology :) Please add any comments xx