The Tree of Life: A Phylogenetic Classification (Harvard University Press Reference Library) - Hardcover

Lecointre, Guillaume; Le Guyader, Herve; Le Guyader, Hervé; Visset, Dominique; Mccoy, Karen

 
9780674021839: The Tree of Life: A Phylogenetic Classification (Harvard University Press Reference Library)
Hardcover
ISBN 10: 0674021835 ISBN 13: 9780674021839
Publisher: Harvard University Press, 2007

Synopsis

Did you know that you are more closely related to a mushroom than to a daisy? That crocodiles are closer to birds than to lizards? That dinosaurs are still among us? That the terms "fish," "reptiles," and "invertebrates" do not indicate scientific groupings? All this is the result of major changes in classification, whose methods have been totally revisited over the last thirty years.

Modern classification, based on phylogeny, no longer places humans at the center of nature. Groups of organisms are no longer defined by their general appearance, but by their different individual characteristics. Phylogeny, therefore, by showing common ancestry, outlines a tree of evolutionary relationships from which one can retrace the history of life.

This book diagrams the tree of life according to the most recent methods of classification. By showing how life forms arose and developed and how they are related, The Tree of Life presents a key to the living world in all its dazzling variety.,

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

About the Authors

Guillaume Lecointre is Professor and Research Scientist at the Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Paris.

Hervé Le Guyader is Professor of Evolutionary Biology at the Université Pierre-et-Marie-Curie (Université Paris 6).

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.

Publisher
Harvard University Press
Publication date
2007
Language
English
ISBN 10 
0674021835
ISBN 13 
9780674021839
Binding
Hardcover
Number of pages
560