QABiology › What Is the Relationship Between the Fields of Taxonomy, Systematics, And Cladistics
Q

What Is the Relationship Between the Fields of Taxonomy, Systematics, And Cladistics

A

Cladistics, systematic, and taxonomy all play an inherent role in the taxonomic classification of organisms.

Taxonomy is simply naming organisms and putting them into groups based on pre-set rules.

Systematic on the other hand is the study of how closely related organisms are, their ancestry, or if they share a common ancestor.

Cladistics is a form of systematic which studies the occurrence of characters in a common ancestry and how it enhances the explanation of monophyletic groups.

In a bid to group and name organisms, many researchers use the Cladistics approach to classify organisms based on their biological evolution. Also, Taxonomy focuses on comparative morphology. Where there is a need to classify organisms based on how they look (height, color, shape, eyeball, etc.)

Generally, taxonomy entails naming and grouping organisms, systematic is concerned with properly placing organism on a phylogenic tree based on their genetic composition and cladistics puts into consideration the ancestry as well as the monophyletic grouping of the organisms in question.

3 years ago
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