MAST200 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Monera, Sequence Alignment, Animal

• School: University of Delaware
• Department: Marine Studies
• Course: MAST200
• Professor: Thoroughgood Carolyn

Document Summary

Taxonomic classification - based on organism"s structure (shape, size, color) = morphology. In 1735, linnaeus developed taxonomic (ordered) classification used in zoology. Hierarchical categories from largest to smallest: kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, species--fundamental unit. The name consists of the genus name combined with a trivial name (binomial nomenclature) Genus begins with capital, trivial (species) begins with lowercase. Classification: an organized scheme of grouping organisms--a tool for communication. Taxonomy: the practice of naming and classifying organisms. Hierarchical: a series of successive and inclusive rankings. Today, we know much more about the recipe of living things: their dna sequence, and how evolution influences this dna sequence. Dna is a blueprint: the replicator molecule. Single strand of human dna contains few billion nucleotides. Dna of simpler life forms have fewer nucleotides. Bioinformatics - interdisciplinary field that develops methods and software tools for understanding biological data. Combines compsci, stat, math, and engineering to analyze and interpret biological data.