What is a Species?
Tues. & Thurs. Week 3

Announcements:

• Homework assignments - posted on Moodle (see below)

• News item dates to sign up for coming Thursday

• Sign up for a field trip!

• Up-coming events you can attend for outside assignments #1 & 2; DUE BY 4/16 (Thursday before last week of classes)

• How many species ARE there??? New research published in Aug. 2011 gives some new estimates:

  • Nature News version of story:  http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110823/full/news.2011.498.html#B1

  • Times Independent version:  http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/nature/the-world-has-87-million-species-but-weve-hardly-met-any-of-them-2342752.html

Homework Assignments:

1. "From DNA to Species"  - Arrange the list of concepts given (see Moodle site for details) into a hierarchical concept map that connects species to DNA. (due Thursday)

2. "Kingdoms & Phylogeny" -  Choose an organism & identify it, then classify it using the taxonomic hierarchy. (see Moodle site for details)  (due next Tuesday)

Tuesday - Genetic Diversity:

Question 1: What is a species?

• biological species concept

Question 2: What makes species different?  Sources of variation - GENETICS

• Where are genes found?  What are chromosomes made of?  Where do we each get our chromosomes from?

• What is a hybrid?  Differences in numbers of chromosomes among species - why is this important?

• Genetic traits - different forms of a gene = alleles

• Examples of human traits; dominant vs. recessive forms of a gene - examples?

• How do the forms of alleles get passed from parents to offspring, and what will offspring "look like"?

• What is a genotype?  what is a phenotype?  How do dominant & recessive genes determine these 2 things?

• what are the sources of genetic variation in species?

• what is the hierarchical relationship between species - individuals - cells - chromosomes & genes - DNA?

Tuesday: "Species & Genetics" Powerpoint presentation

Thursday - Species Diversity:

Question 3:  How do new species arise?

• Speciation - vertical change vs branching evolution; which increases # of species, and therefore diversity?

• mechanisms that can "interrupt gene flow" between populations

• geographic isolation - how do we tell if speciation has occurred?

Question 4:  How do we organize species diversity?

• Phylogeny - making "family trees" for organisms

• What are the 8 levels of the taxonomic hierarchy we use today in biology?

• what are the 3 domains?  Kingdoms?  (be able to name them)

• Be able to classify a common/well-known organism to at least Domain & Kingdom

Question 5:  How many species are there on Earth?

• Nature News version of story:  http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110823/full/news.2011.498.html#B1

• Times Independent version:  http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/nature/the-world-has-87-million-species-but-weve-hardly-met-any-of-them-2342752.html

Thursday: "Species & Speciation" Powerpoint presentation

What Kingdom??