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Classification of Living Things
NOTES
A. Classification Vocabulary
1. Taxonomy defined: The
branch of biology that deals
with naming and classifying
organisms.
2. Autotrophe or Producer: an
organism that makes its own
food using sunlight energy. Its
food is glucose!
3. Heterotrophe or Consumer:
an organism that cannot make
its own food and must eat other
organisms in order to get
energy.
4. Hosts: organisms that provide a
home and/or food for a
parasite.
5. Parasite: an organism that
survives by living on or in a
host organism and causes
harm to that organism.
6. Decomposers: organisms that
break down dead organisms
into simpler substances,
thereby returning important
materials to the soil and water.
B. Groups or levels for classifying
living things:
Kingdom
Phylum
is a subgroup of
Class
Order is a subgroup of
Family
Genus
species
C. Writing the scientific name of a living
thing using a word processor:
Genus name
species name
(e.g. Homo sapiens)
D. If you write it by hand then
underline:
Genus name
(e.g. Homo sapiens)
species name
E. Six Kingdoms of Living Things
1. Archaebacteria: single cell
organisms w/o a nucleus that live in
extreme environments.
2. Eubacteria: single cell
organism w/o a nucleus that live in a
variety of environments, but not
extreme environments.
3. Protists: single cell organisms
w/ a nucleus (e.g. amoeba,
paramecium, and diatoms).
(NOTE: Bacteria & Protists have both
producers and consumer forms.)
4. Fungi: unicellular to
multicellular organisms (includes
mushrooms, yeasts and molds). These
are consumers.
5. Plants: unicellular to
multicellular organisms (includes
mosses, ferns and seed plants). These
are producers.
6. Animals: multicellular organisms
(includes those w/ backbones and
those w/o). These are consumers.