The Diversity of Life
View Diversity of Life Notes.pdf from BIOL 100 at Minnesota State University, Mankato. 1/21/2021 DIVERSITY OF LIFE 1 DIVERSITY OF LIFE Domain. 3 groups in which all organisms fit. Bacteria. AOB352 IFFYThe Diversity of Life Wilson, Edward O. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press 1992-01-01 Paperback 9.54 1 Used: Good Has some wear but is in Good condition and is a very readable copy. SCIENCE AND MATH 0.00 2020-05-24 6 77902.
Fossils
The word fossil means literally 'dug up.' More practically, they are remains or evidence of once living organisms. Fossils are of great value for geologists. They are used for stratigraphic correlation and for studying the evolution of life on Earth through time.
Fossil Preservation
Organisms are made up of organic matter ('soft parts') and inorganic skeletal materials ('hard parts'). There are various modes of fossil preservation:
preservation of hard parts is the most common. Shell, bones, and other skeletal materials may be preserved mostly unaltered or in varying degrees of alteration. Over time shell and bone material may be recrystallized, obscuring the finer structure.
preservation of soft parts is rare because organic matter is subject to decay (oxidation). Soft parts may be preserved for hundreds of thousands or millions of years if rapidly buried in an oxygen poor environment, such as in an organic rich swamp, or if frozen in ice, such as wooly mammoths and the recently found 'ice man' preserved in ice.
permineralization is the molecule by molecule replacement of an organisms original material for by stable inorganic materials. Petrified wood is a good example. Wood is organic matter that is subject to decay. But sometimes buried logs will have the woody organic matter replaced by silica (quartz) slowly as the groundwater seeps through the wood. Some of the woods structure is retained, such as the wood grain.
carbonization is another mode of preservation of organic matter. Sometimes as organic matter, say a leaf, slowly oxidizes, their may be a thin film of carbon left. There may also be a leaf impression.
molds and casts may be left if shell material dissolves before the mud that the shells were encased in. Molds are hollows in the shape of the shell left after the shell has dissolved. Casts are the mud left from the inside of the shell after the shell has dissolved.
trace fossils such as tracks and trails, burrows, and coprolites (feces) may tell us much about a fossil organisms habits and diet.
The Six Kingdoms of Life (viruses not included)
Living things have the ability to maintain themselves and reproduce. Anything from the lowliest, single-cell bacterium to the most complex vertebrates and towering redwood trees have that ability. Viruses, on the other hand are only quasi living. They are not much more than bundles of DNA. To survive, they force host cells to carry out these functions for them.
There are millions of species of organisms living on the Earth today. Many millions of others that lived in the past are now extinct. Scientists and natural philosophers (such as Aristotle in ancient Greece) have recognized that organisms can be organized according to similarities and differences.
The most basic difference between organism is the distinction between prokaryotes and eukaryotes. Prokaryotes are the simplest, most primitive kinds of single-celled organisms. They are the bacteria. They lack a nucleus to hold their genetic material. The DNA (genetic material) in a prokaryotic cell lies in a bundle within the cell. Bacterial cells are quite small (microscopic) and very simple. Eukaryotes are more advanced organisms. They may be single celled, like amoebas and paramecia that you may have seen under a microscope in elementary school, or they may be complex, multicellular organisms like humans. Essentially, all living things on Earth besides bacteria are eukaryotes. Eukaryotic cells have a nucleus that contains the DNA on structures called chromosomes. Eukaryotic cells also contain many bodies called organelles that perform specialized functions to aid in energy processing, etc. Eukarytotic cells are larger than prokaryotic cells, though normally also microscopic.
New themes released and 1m users list. Many kinds of organisms must obtain their energy by breaking down (digesting/metabolizing) organic matter. Animals, fungi, and some prokaryotic and eukaryotic single-celled organisms do this. Many other organisms capture energy by the process of photosynthesis in which sunlight is used to produce carbohydrate (energy store) from carbon dioxide and water. Plants, algae, and some kinds of bacteria do this. Some organisms obtain their energy from dissolved ions by a process known as chemosynthesis. Some of the most primitive bacteria do this.
The tree of life is organized from the most general (kingdoms) down to the most specific level (species). Kingdoms can be subdivided into phyla (phylum is the singular); phyla into classes; classes into orders; orders into families; families into genuses; genuses include many species.
For example, some of the phyla of Kindom Animalia are Phylum Chordata (including the vertebrates), Phylum Arthropoda (including insects, spiders, and crustaceans), and Phylum Porifera (the sponges). humans belong to Kingdom Animalia, Phylum Chordata, Class Mammalia, Order Primates, Family Hominidae, Genus Homo, Species Homo sapiens.
For now we will just introduce the kingdoms. Later, we will discuss the most important fossil groups from each kingdom.
Kingdom Archeobacteria
Archeobacteria are characterized by living in extreme conditions. Some kinds of archeobacteria live in extremely hot water, such as at hot water vents at the midocean ridges called black smokers or in hot springs. Others live in very acidic waters, or very salty waters, or in environments devoid of oxygen. They are considered primitive bacteria. Some of these conditions are similar to condition under which life may have first arisen on Earth. Perhaps the archeobacteria include the oldest kinds of organisms on Earth.
Kingdom Eubacteria
The oldest known living things on Earth are a type of eubacteria. The oldest fossils yet found are 3.5 billion year old cyanobacteria. These are photosynthetic bacteria formerly known as 'blue-green algae.' They are not true algae. True algae are eukaryotes. By about 3.2 billion years ago the fossil record contains the first large fossils called stromatolites. These formed from filamentous cyanobacteria that trapped sediments in mats that often grew into mounds.
(Under some schemes all bacteria are included in one kingdom)
Kingdom Protista
Protists are mostly single-celled (mostly microscopic) eukaryotes, though some simple multicellular organisms are also lumped in with the protists. Some protists secrete a shell and are important contributors to the fossil record.
- Protozoans ingest organic matter to obtain their energy. These include amoebas and paramecia. The most important microfossil protozoans are foraminifera (calcium carbonate shells) and radiolarians (silica shells).
- Algae are photosynthetic protists. Dinoflagellates form a tuff protein casing called a cyst when conditions are poor. These cysts often preserve as fossils. The oldest fossils that may represent eukaryotes are cysts found in rocks about 1.7 billion years old similar to those of the dinoflagellates. The most important algae microfossil are diatoms (silica shells) and calcareous nanoplankton (calcareous shells).
Kingdom Plantae
Plants are multicellular organisms that produce their own energy and via photosysnthesis. They are primary producers on the land. They include everything from mosses to ferns to conifers, like pine trees, to broad leaf trees, like oak trees, to grasses. Plants probably arose during the lower Paleozoic.
Kingdom Fungi
Fungi are multicellular and single-celled organisms that break down dead organic matter within their cells. The multicellular fungi are plant-like in that they lack senses and the ability to move about like animals, but they are incapable of photosynthesis. Mushrooms belong to the Fungus Kingdom. Fungi do not fossilize easily so they are poorly represented in the fossil record. The oldest fossil fungi are from the Cambrian Period.
Kingdom Animalia
Animals are multicellular organisms that ingest organic matter to obtain energy and materials for life. Animals run the gamut from simple sponges and corals, to complex invertebrates like insects and crustaceans, to complex vertebrates like reptiles and mammals. Animals arose during the late Proterozoic, around 600 million years ago or so.
Taxonomy
Taxonomy is the classification of living organisms. Taxonomy groups living things into Kingdoms, which are subdivided into phyla, classes, orders, families, genuses, and species. This was first established by Linneus in the 18th century.
The traditional means of organizing the various genera is with the phylogenetic tree or the branching tree of life. The groupings of similar genera implies relationships among organisms.
cladistics is a method of classification that assumes that living things have ancestral relationships derived from their evolution. A clade is a group of organism that all share a common set of 'primitive' traits (those acquired from some common ancestor).
Figure 1. Life on earth is incredibly diverse.
Biological diversity is the variety of life on earth. This includes all the different plants, animals, and microorganisms; the genes they contain; and the ecosystems they form on land and in water. Biological diversity is constantly changing. It is increased by new genetic variation and reduced by extinction and habitat degradation.
What Is Biodiversity?
Biodiversity refers to the variety of life and its processes, including the variety of living organisms, the genetic differences among them, and the communities and ecosystems in which they occur. Scientists have identified about 1.9 million species alive today. They are divided into the six kingdoms of life shown in Figure 2. Scientists are still discovering new species. Thus, they do not know for sure how many species really exist today. Most estimates range from 5 to 30 million species.
Figure 2. Click for a larger image. Known life on earth
Cogs and Wheels
To save every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering.
—Aldo Leopold, Round River: from the Journals of Aldo Leopold, 1953
Leopold—often considered the father of modern ecology—would have likely found the term biodiversity an appropriate description of his 'cogs and wheels,' even though idea did not become a vital component of biology until nearly 40 years after his death in 1948.
Literally, the word biodiversity means the many different kinds (diversity) of life (bio-), or the number of species in a particular area.
Biologists, however, are always alert to levels of organization, and have identified three unique measures of life's variation:
- The most precise and specific measure of biodiversity is genetic diversity or genetic variation within a species. This measure of diversity looks at differences among individuals within a population, or at difference across different populations of the same species.
- The level just broader is species diversity, which best fits the literal translation of biodiversity: the number of different species in a particular ecosystem or on Earth. This type of diversity simply looks at an area and reports what can be found there.
- At the broadest most encompassing level, we have ecosystem diversity. As Leopold clearly understood, the 'cogs and wheels' include not only life but also the land, sea, and air that support life. In ecosystem diversity, biologists look at the many types of functional units formed by living communities interacting with their environments.
Although all three levels of diversity are important, the term biodiversity usually refers to species diversity!
Video Review
Watch this discussion about biodiversity:
You can view the transcript for 'Biodiversity from ‘the Wild Classroom'' here (link opens in new window).
Biodiversity provides us with all of our food. It also provides for many medicines and industrial products, and it has great potential for developing new and improved products for the future. Perhaps most importantly, biological diversity provides and maintains a wide array of ecological 'services.' These include provision of clean air and water, soil, food and shelter. The quality—and the continuation— of our life and our economy is dependent on these 'services.'
Australia's Biological Diversity
The Six Kingdoms of Life (viruses not included)
Living things have the ability to maintain themselves and reproduce. Anything from the lowliest, single-cell bacterium to the most complex vertebrates and towering redwood trees have that ability. Viruses, on the other hand are only quasi living. They are not much more than bundles of DNA. To survive, they force host cells to carry out these functions for them.
There are millions of species of organisms living on the Earth today. Many millions of others that lived in the past are now extinct. Scientists and natural philosophers (such as Aristotle in ancient Greece) have recognized that organisms can be organized according to similarities and differences.
The most basic difference between organism is the distinction between prokaryotes and eukaryotes. Prokaryotes are the simplest, most primitive kinds of single-celled organisms. They are the bacteria. They lack a nucleus to hold their genetic material. The DNA (genetic material) in a prokaryotic cell lies in a bundle within the cell. Bacterial cells are quite small (microscopic) and very simple. Eukaryotes are more advanced organisms. They may be single celled, like amoebas and paramecia that you may have seen under a microscope in elementary school, or they may be complex, multicellular organisms like humans. Essentially, all living things on Earth besides bacteria are eukaryotes. Eukaryotic cells have a nucleus that contains the DNA on structures called chromosomes. Eukaryotic cells also contain many bodies called organelles that perform specialized functions to aid in energy processing, etc. Eukarytotic cells are larger than prokaryotic cells, though normally also microscopic.
New themes released and 1m users list. Many kinds of organisms must obtain their energy by breaking down (digesting/metabolizing) organic matter. Animals, fungi, and some prokaryotic and eukaryotic single-celled organisms do this. Many other organisms capture energy by the process of photosynthesis in which sunlight is used to produce carbohydrate (energy store) from carbon dioxide and water. Plants, algae, and some kinds of bacteria do this. Some organisms obtain their energy from dissolved ions by a process known as chemosynthesis. Some of the most primitive bacteria do this.
The tree of life is organized from the most general (kingdoms) down to the most specific level (species). Kingdoms can be subdivided into phyla (phylum is the singular); phyla into classes; classes into orders; orders into families; families into genuses; genuses include many species.
For example, some of the phyla of Kindom Animalia are Phylum Chordata (including the vertebrates), Phylum Arthropoda (including insects, spiders, and crustaceans), and Phylum Porifera (the sponges). humans belong to Kingdom Animalia, Phylum Chordata, Class Mammalia, Order Primates, Family Hominidae, Genus Homo, Species Homo sapiens.
For now we will just introduce the kingdoms. Later, we will discuss the most important fossil groups from each kingdom.
Kingdom Archeobacteria
Archeobacteria are characterized by living in extreme conditions. Some kinds of archeobacteria live in extremely hot water, such as at hot water vents at the midocean ridges called black smokers or in hot springs. Others live in very acidic waters, or very salty waters, or in environments devoid of oxygen. They are considered primitive bacteria. Some of these conditions are similar to condition under which life may have first arisen on Earth. Perhaps the archeobacteria include the oldest kinds of organisms on Earth.
Kingdom Eubacteria
The oldest known living things on Earth are a type of eubacteria. The oldest fossils yet found are 3.5 billion year old cyanobacteria. These are photosynthetic bacteria formerly known as 'blue-green algae.' They are not true algae. True algae are eukaryotes. By about 3.2 billion years ago the fossil record contains the first large fossils called stromatolites. These formed from filamentous cyanobacteria that trapped sediments in mats that often grew into mounds.
(Under some schemes all bacteria are included in one kingdom)
Kingdom Protista
Protists are mostly single-celled (mostly microscopic) eukaryotes, though some simple multicellular organisms are also lumped in with the protists. Some protists secrete a shell and are important contributors to the fossil record.
- Protozoans ingest organic matter to obtain their energy. These include amoebas and paramecia. The most important microfossil protozoans are foraminifera (calcium carbonate shells) and radiolarians (silica shells).
- Algae are photosynthetic protists. Dinoflagellates form a tuff protein casing called a cyst when conditions are poor. These cysts often preserve as fossils. The oldest fossils that may represent eukaryotes are cysts found in rocks about 1.7 billion years old similar to those of the dinoflagellates. The most important algae microfossil are diatoms (silica shells) and calcareous nanoplankton (calcareous shells).
Kingdom Plantae
Plants are multicellular organisms that produce their own energy and via photosysnthesis. They are primary producers on the land. They include everything from mosses to ferns to conifers, like pine trees, to broad leaf trees, like oak trees, to grasses. Plants probably arose during the lower Paleozoic.
Kingdom Fungi
Fungi are multicellular and single-celled organisms that break down dead organic matter within their cells. The multicellular fungi are plant-like in that they lack senses and the ability to move about like animals, but they are incapable of photosynthesis. Mushrooms belong to the Fungus Kingdom. Fungi do not fossilize easily so they are poorly represented in the fossil record. The oldest fossil fungi are from the Cambrian Period.
Kingdom Animalia
Animals are multicellular organisms that ingest organic matter to obtain energy and materials for life. Animals run the gamut from simple sponges and corals, to complex invertebrates like insects and crustaceans, to complex vertebrates like reptiles and mammals. Animals arose during the late Proterozoic, around 600 million years ago or so.
Taxonomy
Taxonomy is the classification of living organisms. Taxonomy groups living things into Kingdoms, which are subdivided into phyla, classes, orders, families, genuses, and species. This was first established by Linneus in the 18th century.
The traditional means of organizing the various genera is with the phylogenetic tree or the branching tree of life. The groupings of similar genera implies relationships among organisms.
cladistics is a method of classification that assumes that living things have ancestral relationships derived from their evolution. A clade is a group of organism that all share a common set of 'primitive' traits (those acquired from some common ancestor).
Figure 1. Life on earth is incredibly diverse.
Biological diversity is the variety of life on earth. This includes all the different plants, animals, and microorganisms; the genes they contain; and the ecosystems they form on land and in water. Biological diversity is constantly changing. It is increased by new genetic variation and reduced by extinction and habitat degradation.
What Is Biodiversity?
Biodiversity refers to the variety of life and its processes, including the variety of living organisms, the genetic differences among them, and the communities and ecosystems in which they occur. Scientists have identified about 1.9 million species alive today. They are divided into the six kingdoms of life shown in Figure 2. Scientists are still discovering new species. Thus, they do not know for sure how many species really exist today. Most estimates range from 5 to 30 million species.
Figure 2. Click for a larger image. Known life on earth
Cogs and Wheels
To save every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering.
—Aldo Leopold, Round River: from the Journals of Aldo Leopold, 1953
Leopold—often considered the father of modern ecology—would have likely found the term biodiversity an appropriate description of his 'cogs and wheels,' even though idea did not become a vital component of biology until nearly 40 years after his death in 1948.
Literally, the word biodiversity means the many different kinds (diversity) of life (bio-), or the number of species in a particular area.
Biologists, however, are always alert to levels of organization, and have identified three unique measures of life's variation:
- The most precise and specific measure of biodiversity is genetic diversity or genetic variation within a species. This measure of diversity looks at differences among individuals within a population, or at difference across different populations of the same species.
- The level just broader is species diversity, which best fits the literal translation of biodiversity: the number of different species in a particular ecosystem or on Earth. This type of diversity simply looks at an area and reports what can be found there.
- At the broadest most encompassing level, we have ecosystem diversity. As Leopold clearly understood, the 'cogs and wheels' include not only life but also the land, sea, and air that support life. In ecosystem diversity, biologists look at the many types of functional units formed by living communities interacting with their environments.
Although all three levels of diversity are important, the term biodiversity usually refers to species diversity!
Video Review
Watch this discussion about biodiversity:
You can view the transcript for 'Biodiversity from ‘the Wild Classroom'' here (link opens in new window).
Biodiversity provides us with all of our food. It also provides for many medicines and industrial products, and it has great potential for developing new and improved products for the future. Perhaps most importantly, biological diversity provides and maintains a wide array of ecological 'services.' These include provision of clean air and water, soil, food and shelter. The quality—and the continuation— of our life and our economy is dependent on these 'services.'
Australia's Biological Diversity
Figure 2. The short-beaked echidna is endemic to Australia. This animal—along with the platypus and three other species of echidnas—is one of the five surviving species of egg-laying mammals.
Diversity Of Life Biology
The long isolation of Australia over much of the last 50 million years and its northward movement have led to the evolution of a distinct biota. Significant features of Australia's biological diversity include:
Diversity Of Lifestyles
- A high percentage of endemic species (that is, they occur nowhere else):
- over 80% of flowering plants
- over 80% of land mammals
- 88% of reptiles
- 45% of birds
- 92% of frogs
- Wildlife groups of great richness. Australia has an exceptional diversity of lizards in the arid zone, many ground orchids, and a total invertebrate fauna estimated at 200,000 species with more than 4,000 different species of ants alone. Marsupials and monotremes collectively account for about 56% of native terrestrial mammals in Australia.
- Wildlife of major evolutionary importance. For example, Australia has 12 of the 19 known families of primitive flowering plants, two of which occur nowhere else. Some species, such as the Queensland lungfish and peripatus, have remained relatively unchanged for hundreds of millions of years.
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Diversity Of Life Video National Geographic
