What is Systematic?

Systematic = determination of evolutionary history and relationships among organisms (termed phylogeny) Use the relationship to classified animals Collecting data through paleontology, embryology, morphology, behavior, and molecular biology.

 Three major group of systematic:

Phenetic (or numerical taxonomy) Cladistic (or phylogenetic) Evolutionary (or synthetic)
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 Using overall similarity rather than few important characteristics between organisms Each organism is then compared with every other for all characters measured, and the number of similarities (or differences) is calculated.

 More similar characteristics = closely related Less similar characteristics = distantly related Because of the enormous amount of data special computer software needed. The taxonomic clusters (phenograms) obtained do not necessarily reflect genetic

 They only based on appearances (measurable phenotypic similarities and differences). The phenetic approach is also called numerical taxonomy. Since not so accurate, it has less applied now.

 Theory behind cladistic = members of a group share a common evolutionary history, and are thus more "closely related. Example: cats and tiger

 Group members share a set of unique features (apomorphies) that not present in distant (far away) ancestors These shared derived characteristics are called synapomorphies.

 In contrast to phenetics, in cladistics groupings do not depend on whether organisms share physical traits, but on their evolutionary relationships.

Indeed, in cladistic analyses two organisms may share numerous characteristics but still be considered members of different groups.

For example, a jellyfish, a sea star, and a human: jellyfish and sea stars both live in the ocean, have radial symmetry and are invertebrates, so phenetic analysis might place them together in a group

 However, according to cladistic, sea stars actually more closely related to humans (both are deuterostomes). Deuterostomes = during development, the first opening (the blastopore) becomes the anus v.s. Protostomes it becomes the mouth

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 Thus cladistic not only focused on presence of all shared traits, but also presence of shared derived (apomorphic) traits. Cladistic analyses have some pretty strict rules.

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 Cladists always assume that new species arise by bifurcations of the original lineage (the lineage always splits in two).

Most cladists assume that the original ancestral species no longer exists after this bifurcation, so each branching event results in two new species.

Characteristic of cladistic groups:

1.All species in a grouping must share a common ancestor. 2.All species derived from a common ancestor must be included in the taxon. Three different cladistic groups:
Monophyletic Paraphyletic Polyphyletic

 All

species share a common ancestor and all species derived from that common ancestor are included. turtles, lizards, crocodilians and birds are all derived from a shared common ancestor.

Example:

 All species share a common ancestor, but not all species derived from that common ancestor are included

For example, grouping turtles, lizards and crocodiles as "reptiles" and separating that grouping from the birds).

 Any species that do not share an immediate common ancestor are lumped together But excluding other members that would link them Example: a hypothetical group the "lizmams" made by grouping together the lizards and the mammals). Lizard and mammals are not related anyway!!!

MAMMALS

LIZARDS

TURTLES

CROC. BIRDS

 Based strongly on evolutionary relationships. (like cladistic) Study the genealogical (evolutionary) similarities The degree of genetic differences between lineages should also be use

Evolutionary systematic vs. Cladistic 1. Ancestral line development

Evolutionary taxonomists = more tolerant of multiple branches developing synchronously from an ancestral line Cladistic only have two branches (bifurcations of the original lineage = lineage always splits in two).

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2. Species without evolution

Evolutionary taxonomists = treat organisms that unchanged when a new branch arises from their lineage as the same species that existed before the branching event (The original species is not always believed to become extinct every time a branching event occurs).

Cladistic = original ancestral species no longer exists after bifurcation

 The biggest difference:

Evolutionary taxonomists seek to maximize the way in which the groupings they create communicate information about the group of organisms in that taxon (in the way the word "mammal" or "reptile" does for even an untrained person).
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 Taxa generated by an evolutionary biologist will never be polyphyletic, but may be either monophyletic or paraphyletic in nature. For example, as we saw earlier, birds and crocodilians diverged from the same ancestral reptilian line.

 A cladist would insist that these "sister groups" be placed in the same taxon, even though the amount of change from the common ancestor is much greater for the birds than it is for the crocodiles.

 An evolutionary taxonomist would suggest that the large number of similarities between crocodilians and reptiles would justify grouping them within the same general taxon, while placing birds in a separate taxon due to the large number of unique characters possessed by members of this group.