Biology Short Notes- Chapter 1- Living World

Ways of Reproduction

1. Fungi- asexual spores[sporulation}

2. Yeast and Hydra – Budding
3. Planaria (Flat worms) – True regeneration
4. Fungi, Filamentous Algae, Protonema of Masses- Fragmentation

DEFINING CHARACTERISTIC OF LIVING ORGANISMS

-Cellular Organisation (Metabolism) and Consciousness

Important Points

- Increase in mass and increase in number of individuals are twin

characteristics of growth particullary most for unicellular organisms,
non-living objects do grow though not from inside but from
accumulation outside hence growth is not a defining characteristic.

- Reproduction likewise is a characteristic of life forms still not an all

inclusive one hence not defining, because of many organisms that do
not reproduce like mules, sterile worker bees, infertile human
couples.

- Isolated metabolic reactions in vitro are not living things but surely
living reactions.

- All living phenomena are due to underlying reactions

Properties of Tissue are not present in constituent cells but arise as a

result of interaction among the constituent cells.
Similarly same could be said about cellular organelles and their
constituent molecular components

- Living organisms are self replicating, evolving and self regulating

interactive systems capable of responding to external stimuli.
- The number of species that are known and described range
between 1.7-1.8 million, this refers to biodiversity or the number
or types of organisms present on Earth.
- The process of standardizing the naming of living organisms, so
that they are known by the same name all over the world is called
nomenclature.
- The process of describing an organism so that we know what
organism we are referring to is called Identification.
- Body for plant nomenclature- ICBN (International code for
Botanical Nomenclature)
- Body for animal nomenclature- ICZN (International code of
Zoological Nomenclature)
- Scientific name has two 2 components- Generic name and specific
epithet, This system of providing name with 2 components is
called Binomial Nomenclature – This system was given by Carolus
Linnaeus
Eg Mango- scientific name- Mangifera indica “Mangifera- generic
name depicts genus” “indica- specific epithet- depicts species”
- Biological names are derivied from latin or latinised irrespective of
their origin
- Both the components of biological name when hand written are
separately underlined, or printed in italics to depict their latin
origin, the generic name starts with a capital letter while the
specific epithet starts with a small letter
- Name of the author when written is after the biological name in
abbreviated form eg- Mangifera indica Linn
- Classification is the process through which anything is grouped
into convenient categories by help of observable characters.
- The scientific term for categories is “taxa”, one thing to remember
is taxa can indicate categories at very different levels.
- Hence, based on characteristics all living organisms can be
classified into different taxa, this process of classification is called
“taxonomy”.
- The basis of modern taxonomy are formed by <i>External and
Internal structure <ii>Structure of cell, developmental process
<iii>Ecological information of organisms
- Characterization, identification, classification & nomenclature are
the processes that are basic to taxonomy.
- Word systematics is derived from latin word “systema” which
means systematic arrangement of organisms. Linnaeus used
“Systema Naturae” as the title of his publication
- The scope of systematics was later enlarged to include-
identification, nomenclature, and classification
- “Systematics” takes into account evolutionary relationships
between organisms.
- Classification is not a single step process but infact involves
heirarchy of steps in which each step represents a rank or
category.
- Since the category is a part of overall taxonomic arrangement it is
called taxonomic category and all taxonomic categories together
constitute taxonomic heirarchy.
- Each category referred to as a unit of classification, in fact
represents a rank and is commonly termed as taxon [plural taxa]
- Groups represent category, category further denotes rank, each
rank or taxon in fact represents a unit of classification.
- These taxonomic groups/categories are distant biological entities
and not merely morphological aggregates.
- Taxonomical categories- Kingdom, Phylum (animals) & Division
(plants), class, order, family, genus and species.

Trick- Shantanu Gokhale Family Ordered Classy Dal Paratha &

Kebab.

- Highest Category <least similarities> - Kingdom

- Lowest Category <most similarities> - Species

TAXONOMIC CATEGORIES:-

Species
- Group of Individual organisms with fundamental similarities are
classified in species
- One should be able to differentiate one species from other closely
related species based on distinct morphological differences
- Each genus may have one or more than one specific epithets
representing different organisms, but having morphological
similarities eg; Panthera has leo[lion] and tigris[tiger] , Solanum
includes species like nigrum and melongena

Genus
- Genus comprises a group of related species which has more
characters in common in comparison to species of other genera
- Eg; Potato and Brinjal are 2 different species but both belong to
the same genus Solanum , Lion and Leopard [Panthera pardus]
and tiger with several common features are all species of the
genus Panthera, this genus differs from another genus Felis which
includes cats.

Family
- Families are characterized on the basis of both vegetative and
reproductive features of plant species.
- Eg; Among plants: Three different genera Solanum, Petunia and
Datura are placed in the family Solanaceae. Among animals:
Genus Panthera is put along with Felis.
- Cats and Dogs are put in different families Felidae and Canidae
respectively.

Order
- Order and other higher taxonomic categories are based on the
aggregates of characters <there are fewer similarities in
comparison to lower taxonomic categories>
- Eg; Plant families like Solanaceae and Convolvulaceae are
included in the order Polymoniales mainly based on the floral
characters, In animals the order Carnivora includes families like
Canidae and Felidae .

Class
- This category includes related orders
- Eg; Order Primata comprising monkey, gorilla and gibbon is placed
in class Mamalia along with order Carnivora that includes animals
 like tiger, cat and dog. It is important to note Class Mamalia has
other orders too.

Phylum
- In case of plants the taxonomic category with fewer similar
characters than class is called Division and the same for animals is
called Phylum.
- Eg; Classes comprising animals like fishes, amphibians, reptiles,
birds along with mammals constitute the Phylum Chordata based
on the common features like presence of notochord and dorsal
hollow neural system

Kingdom
- This is the highest category incase of animals it is called Kingdom
Animalia and incase of plants Kingdom Plantae.

Aside from these categories scientists have developed sub-

categories to facilitate more sound and scientific placement of
various taxa.

As we go from species to kingdom, we see the number of common

characteristics goes on decreasing, lower the taxa, more are the
characteristics the members within the taxon share, Hence higher
the category, greater is the difficulty of determining the
relationship to other taxa at the same level. Hence the problem of
classification becomes more complex.
NCERT TABLE, PAGE-11 <1.1>

TAXONOMICAL AIDS

- The collection of actual specimens of plants and animals species is

essential and is the prime source of taxonomic studies, These are
also fundamental to studies and essential for training in
systematics.

AID 1; HERBARIUM
- Herbarium is a store house of collected plant specimens that are
dried, pressed and preserved on sheets, Further these sheets are
arranged according to universally accepted system of
classification
- Herbarium sheets carry a label carrying information about <i>
date and place of collection <ii> English, local and botanical names
<iii> Plant family and collector’s name
- Herbaria also serves as quick referral systems in taxonomic
studies
AID 2; BOTANICAL GARDENS
- These specialized gardens have collections of living plants for
reference, plant species in these gardens are grown for
identification purposes, each plant is labeled indicating it’s
botanical and scientific name and it’s family
- Famous botanical gardens; Kew (England) Indian Botanical Garden
(Howrah, India) National Botanical Research Institute (Lucknow,
India)
 AID 3; MUSEUM
- Collections of preserved plant and animal specimens for study and
reference, they are preserved in the containers, or jars in
preservative solutions
- Plant and animal specimens may also be preserved as dry
specimens
- Insects are preserved in insect boxes after collecting, killing and
pinning, larger animals like birds and mammals are usually stuffed
and preserved, Museums often have collections of skeletons of
animals too.
AID 4; ZOOLOGICAL PARKS
- They enable us to learn about food habits of animals and their
behavior, all animals in zoo are provided as far as possible
conditions similar to their natural habitat
AID 5; KEY
- Key is used for identification of plants and animals based on
similarities and dissimilarities
- They are based on contrasting characters generally in a pair called
“couplet”, it represents choice made between 2 opposite options,
one is accepted and the other is rejected, each statement in a key
is called “lead”.
- Separate taxonomic keys are required for each taxonomic
category such as genus, family and species (for identification
purposes)
- Keys are generally analytical in nature
Flora contains actual account of habitat and distribution of plants in
a given area, They provide index for plant species found in a
particular area

Manuals are useful in providing information for identification of

names of species

Monographs contain information of any one taxon.