BIOL 230 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Carl Woese, Endospore, Prokaryote
Document Summary
Taxonomy is the science that characterize and name organisms to arrange them into hierarchical groups (taxa). Process of characterizing an isolate in order to group. Species is basic unit: group of morphologically similar organisms capable of producing fertile offspring: definition problematic for prokaryotes (reproduction is by binary fission) Species is group of closely related isolates or strains. Informal groupings also used: may be genetically unrelated. Kingdoms for prokaryotes still in state of flux: phylogeny is evolutionary relatedness. Yields three-domain system based on carl woese et. al. Does not reflect recent genetic insights of ribosomal rna data indicating plants and animals more closely related than archaea to bacteria: bergey"s manual of systematic bacteriology. Phenotypic characteristics to identify prokaryotes: microscopic morphology, culture characteristics, metabolic capabilities, serology, protein analysis. Microscopic morphology: quickly determines size, shape, staining characteristics. Sometimes enough to diagnose eukaryotic infections: gram stain distinguishes gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria.
