The evolutionary tree of living things is currently supposed to run something along the lines of that listed below. Most of the tree was based on ideas from cladistics; where more than two groups are shown in a single branch, there is disagreement about how they diverged. Hypothetically taxonomy would follow the tree whenever possible, but in many places it does not at present.
The description as a "tree" results from earlier ideas of life as a progression from lower to higher forms. Although such views are discredited now, the imagery is too well established to be readily lost.
The terminology originates with Linnaean taxonomy: living things are classified as belonging to domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus and species.
- Life
- Domain Eubacteria
- Domain Archaea
- Domain Eukaryota, organisms with cells containing a nucleus
- Pelobionts
- Entamoebae
- Retortamonads
- Diplomonads (e.g. Giardia)
- Oxymonads
- Parabasalia
- Jakobids
- Heterolobosea (e.g. Naegleria, Acrasis)
- Euglenozoa (e.g. Euglena, Bodo, Trypanosoma'')
- Stephanopogon
- Nucleariids
- Apusomonads
- Cercomonads
- Ellobiopsids
- Kathablepharids
- Pseudodendromonads
- Spironemids
- Spongomonads
- Thaumatomonads
- Chlorarachniophytes
- Copromyxids
- Granuloreticulosa (e.g. Foraminiferans)
- Plasmodiophorids
- Vampyrellids
- Ramicristates (most lobose and filose amoebae, plasmodial and cellular slime moulds, e.g. Amoeba, Physarum, Dictyosteliium)
- Dimorphids
- Desmothoracids
- Gymnosphaerids
- Sticholonche
- Acantharea
- Phaeodarea
- Polycystinea
- Paramyxea
- Haplosporidia
- Alveolates
- Ebriids
- Haptophytes
- Stramenopiles (e.g. golden algae, diatoms, brown algae, water molds)
- Xenophyophorea
- Cryptomonads
- Glaucophytes
- Red algae (e.g. Polysiphonia)
- Gymnophrea
- Centrohelids
- "Opisthokonts"
- Kingdom Plantae, plants and green algae
See Also
External links and References
- Colin Tudge, "The Variety of Life — A survey and a celebration of all the creatures that have ever lived", Oxford University Press, 2000
- http://tolweb.org/tree/phylogeny.html The Tree of Life — A multi-authored, distributed Internet project containing information about phylogeny and biodiversity
More examples
