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INTRODUCTION
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ALL SPECIES
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Who can imagine a world devoid of a miriad strange and beautiful life forms? Who would want to? The thousands of species on earth are what make this planet stand out from any other place we know of in the universe. They create the conditions which enable us humans to survive, and their mere existance enriches our lives in ways too numerous to count.
Some groups of species have, fairly or not, gotten a bad reputation: bacteria, creepy-crawlies of all denominations, all things venomous and ferocious, and so on. (And who can't think of at least one or two vermin they'd rather not run into in the dark?) But even folks with an aversion to some particular critter can still appreciate the sheer diversity of life on earth. It is truly a wonder!
In this page, I try to bring together in one place the considerable resources available on the web for exploring the diversity of life. Some of this information will be meaningful only to the scientist (or to someone with a term paper due about some obscure group of species!). But at least some of these links should appeal to anyone with a healthy curiousity.
I obviously didn't read every bit of all the web pages linked in this site! They were all briefly screened for content, and are all working as of July, 1997. I try to give a little descriptive information about the linked site when ever possible. A star (
Sites were chosen to exemplify biological diversity. In particular, I selected sites with taxonomic information, phylogenetic information, and/or images. I did NOT choose sites based on the volume or quality of overall biological information outside of taxonomy and phylogenetics.
I avoided pages whose focus is not on the biology or diversity of a group of species. Specifically, I left out pages which are primarily about fishing, aquaria, zoos, herbaria or botanical gardens, pets, medicine, molecular or cellular biology, genetics, physiology, microscopy or other scientific technologies, books or CDs for sale, university departments/research/faculty, photography, societies/organizations, bulletin boards/newsletters/newsgroups/listserves, edible species, agriculture, etc. I also omitted pages which are solely about local or regional biodiversity. The common focus of all the pages linked below is the diversity, classification, and/or general appreciation of one or more groups of organisms. One final note. I did not include a section about viruses for two reasons: 1) Many scientists do not consider them true living things and 2) The focus of most virus information is likely to be medical or agricultural.
I organized the links for each Kingdom into various categories based on what kind of sites I found on the web. These categories are not exactly the same from one Kingdom to the next because very different kinds of websites exist for, say, bacteria and plants. However, I try to be as consistant as possible in the way in which links are presented and reviewed. In order to make each category as complete as possible, some sites are cross-listed under several categories, both within and across Kingdoms. However, if you are looking for particular information, I recommed perusing at least the All Species category, as well as the "general information" category under the Kingdom of interest, rather than looking only under a more narrow sub-topic.
If you know of a page that I should add, drop me a line. I'd also appreciate a note if a linked page has moved or died; or if you notice any errors in the information on this page. Thanks.
INTRODUCTION
ABOUT THIS PAGE
) next to a link just means I think it's a really neat site-- it's a totally subjective rating system!
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Since the purpose of this page is to be a biological web directory, I have also taken every effort to ensure that the sites I link to on this page, including web rings, are appropriate for children and generally educational in nature. If you encounter any adult material on a website to which I have a link, please notify me at the above e-mail address. Thank you.
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Jump to a brief explanation of taxonomy. |
For those folks who aren't familiar with the lingo, here are a few quick and dirty definitions. DISCLAIMER: These definitions are provided as general background information. For more precise information, I suggest consulting a textbook or library.
cladistics or phylogenetic systematics: the science of classifying organisims strictly on their evolutionary relatedness. The functional grouping unit is a "clade," a group of organisisms with a common ancestor. For more information on cladistics, try Introduction to Cladistics or Journey into Phylogenetic Systematics.
eukaryote: an organism whose cells contain nuclei. All organisms except the bacteria are eukaryotes.
morphology: having to do with shape. In reference to organisims, it has to do with their physicial (but not molecular or behavioral) characteristics, including microscopic traits.
organism: any individual living thing. It can refer to a bacterium, a fern, a mushroom, a tick, a human-anything alive.
phylogenetics: the study of how organisms are related to one another. Using the fossil record together with characteristics of living species such as morphology, behavior, and molecular analysis of proteins and DNA, scientists make a "best guess" about how closely various species are related. They try to determine how long ago two or more species had a common ancestor. A "phylogeny" is a sort of family tree, showing how one group of species gave rise to other groups. For more information about phylogenetics, check out The Phylogeny of Life.
prokaryote: an organism whose cells do not contain nuclei. Only the bacteria are prokaryotes.
species: Know one really knows how to define this term! Here's one definition that I committed to memory for an undergraduate class, so I guess it's as good as any other: "A group of actually or potentially interbreeding organisisms reproductively isolated from other such groups." In English, this means that members of a species can mate, but they can't or won't mate with members of another species. (And if they do, the result is a hybrid, which is supposed to have problems like sterility--this isn't always the case, especially in plants.) For most purposes, the species is the smallest unit of taxonomic classification.
taxonomy:
Within a particular group of organisims, scientists usually try to give the same "Latinized" ending to the names of all groups at the same taxonomic level. For example, all the Divisions of plants end in "-phyta," and Families of animals usually end in "-idae." This can be a helpful clue as to which taxonomic level you are dealing with. One final tidbit. When referring to a particular species, it is correct to give both genus and species together. The genus is capitalized, but the species is not. Both should be italicized or underlined. As an example, here is the taxonomic classification for the grey wolf:
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ABOUT THIS PAGE
DEFINITION OF TERMS
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BACTERIA
PROTISTS
FUNGI
PLANTS
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