Basic Components (Principles) of Systematic

Various systematic activities are directed towards the singular goal of constructing an ideal
system of classification that necessitates the procedures of identification, description, nomenclature and
constructing affinities. This enables a better management of information to be utilized by different
workers, investigating different aspects, structure and functioning of different species of plant.

Identification

Identification or determination is recognizing an unknown specimen with an already Plants,

Taxonomy and Systematics 9 known taxon, and assigning a correct rank and position in an extant
classification. In practice, it involves finding a name for an unknown specimen. This may be achieved by
visiting a herbarium and comparing unknown specimen with duly identified specimens stored in the
herbarium. Alternately, the specimen may also be sent to an expert in the field who can help in the
identification.

Identification can also be achieved using various types of literature such as Floras, Monographs
or Manuals and making use of identification keys provided in these sources of literature. After the
unknown specimen has been provisionally identified with the help of a key, the identification can be
further confirmed by comparison with the detailed description of the taxon provided in the literature
source.

A method that is becoming popular over the recent years involves taking a photograph of the
plant and its parts, uploading this picture on the website and informing the members of appropriate
electronic Lists or Newsgroups, who can see the photograph at the website and send their comments to
the enquirer. Members of the fraternity could thus help each other in identification in a much efficient
manner.

Description

The description of a taxon involves listing its features by recording the appropriate character
states. A shortened description consisting of only those taxonomic characters which help in separating a
taxon from other closely related taxa, forms the diagnosis, and the characters are termed as diagnostic
characters. The diagnostic characters for a taxon determine its circumscription. The description is
recorded in a set pattern (habit, stem, leaves, flower, sepals, petals, stamens, carpels, fruit, etc.). For
each character, an appropriate character-state is listed. Flower colour (character) may thus be red,
yellow, white, etc. (states). The description is recorded in semi-technical language using specific terms
for each character state to enable a proper documentation of data.

Whereas the fresh specimens can be described conveniently, the dry specimens need to be
softened in boiling water or in a wetting agent before these could be described. Softening is often
essential for dissection of flowers in order to study their details.

Nomenclature
 Nomenclature deals with the determination of a correct name for a taxon. There are different
sets of rules for different groups of living organisms. Nomenclature of plants (including fungi) is
governed by the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature (ICBN) through its rules and
recommendations. Updated every six years or so, the Botanical Code helps in picking up a single correct
name out of numerous scientific names available for a taxon, with a particular circumscription, position
and rank. To avoid inconvenient name changes for certain taxa, a list of conserved names is provided in
the Code. Cultivated plants are governed by the International Code of Nomenclature for Cultivated
Plants (ICNCP), slightly modified from and largely based on the Botanical Code.

Names of animals are governed by the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN);
those of bacteria by International Code for the Nomenclature of Bacteria (ICNB), now called
Bacteriological Code (BC). A separate Code exists for viruses, named the International Code of Virus
Classification and Nomenclature (ICVCN).

With the onset of electronic revolution and the need to have a common database for living
organisms for global communication a common uniform code is being attempted. The Draft BioCode is
the first public expression of these objectives. The first draft was prepared in 1995. After successive
reviews the fourth draft, named Draft BioCode (1997) prepared by the International Committee for
Bionomenclature was published by Greuter et al., (1998) and is now available on the web.The last
decade of twentieth century also saw the development of rankless PhyloCode based on the concepts of
phylogenetic 10 Plant Systematics systematics. It omits all ranks except species and ‘clades’ based on the
concept of recognition of monophyletic groups. The latest version of PhyloCode (PhyloCode4b, 2007) is
also available on the web.

Phylogeny

Phylogeny is the study of the genealogy and evolutionary history of a taxonomic group.
Genealogy is the study of ancestral relationships and lineages. Relationships are depicted through a
diagram better known as a phylogram (Stace, 1989), since the commonly used term cladogram is more
appropriately used for a diagram constructed through cladistic methodology. A phylogram is a branching
diagram based on the degree of advancement (apomorphy) in the descendants, the longest branch
representing the most advanced group. This is distinct from a phylogenetic tree in which the vertical
scale represents a geological time-scale and all living groups reach the top, with primitive ones near the
centre and advanced ones near the periphery. Monophyletic groups, including all the descendants of a
common ancestor, are recognized and form entities in a classification system. Paraphyletic groups,
wherein some descendants of a common ancestor are left out, are reunited. Polyphyletic groups, with
more than one common ancestor, are split to form monophyletic groups. Phenetic information may
often help in determining a phylogenetic relationship.

Classification

Classification is an arrangement of organisms into groups on the basis of similarities. The groups
are, in turn, assembled into more inclusive groups, until all the organisms have been assembled into a
single
most inclusive group. In sequence of increasing inclusiveness, the groups are assigned to a fixed
hierarchy of categories such as species, genus, family, order, class and division, the final arrangement
constituting a system of classification. The process of classification includes assigning appropriate
position and rank to a new taxon (a taxonomic group assigned to any rank; pl. taxa), dividing a taxon into
smaller units, uniting two or more taxa into one, transferring its position from one group to another and
altering its rank. Once established, a classification provides an important mechanism of information
storage, retrieval and usage. This ranked system of classification is popularly known as the Linnaean
system. Taxonomic entities are classified in different fashions:

1. Artificial classification is utilitarian, based on arbitrary, easily observable characters such as habit,
colour, number, form or similar features. The sexual system of Linnaeus, which fits in this category,
utilized the number of stamens for primary classification of the flowering plants.

2. Natural classification uses overall similarity in grouping taxa, a concept initiated by M. Adanson and
culminating in the extensively used classification of Bentham and Hooker. Natural systems of the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries used morphology in delimiting the overall similarity. The concept
of overall similarity has undergone considerable refinement in recent years. As against the sole
morphological features as indicators of similarity in natural systems,overall similarity is now judged on
the basis of features derived from all the available fields of taxonomic information (phonetic
relationship).

3. Phenetic Classification makes the use of overall similarity in terms of a phenetic relationship based on
data from all available sources such as morphology, anatomy, embryology, phytochemistry,
ultrastructure and, in fact, all other fields of study. Phenetic classifications were strongly advocated by
Sneath and Sokal (1973) but did not find much favour with major systems of classification of higher
plants. Phenetic relationship has, however, been very prominently used Plants, Taxonomy and
Systematics 11 in modern phylogenetic systems to decide the realignments within the system of
classification.

4. Phylogenetic classification is based on the evolutionary descent of a group of organisms, the

relationship depicted either through a phylogram, phylogenetic tree or a cladogram. Classification is
constructed with this premise in mind, that all the descendants of a common ancestor should be placed
in the same group (i.e., group should be monophyletic). If some descendents have been left out,
rendering the group paraphyletic, these are brought back into the group to make it monophyletic
(merger of Asclepiadaceae with Apocynaceae, and the merger of Capparaceae with Brassicaceae in
recent classifications). Similarly, if the group is polyphyletic (with members from more than one phyletic
lines, it is split to create monophyletic taxa (Genus Arenaria split into Arenaria and Minuartia). This
approach, known as cladistics, is practiced by cladists.

5. Evolutionary taxonomic classification differs from a phylogenetic classification in that the gaps in the
variation pattern of phylogenetically adjacent groups are regarded as more important in recognizing
groups. It accepts leaving out certain descendants of a common ancestor (i.e. recognizing paraphyletic
groups) if the gaps are not significant, thus failing to provide a true picture of the genealogical history.
The characters considered to be of significance in the evolution (and the classification based on these)
are dependent on expertise, authority and intuition of systematists. Such classifications have been
advocated by Simpson (1961), Ashlock (1979), Mayr and Ashlock (1991) and Stuessy (1990). The
approach, known as eclecticism, is practiced by eclecticists.

The contemporary phylogenetic systems of classification, including those of Takhtajan, Cronquist,

Thorne and Dahlgren, are largely based on decisions in which phenetic information is liberally used in
deciding the phylogenetic relationship between groups, differing largely on the weightage given to the
cladistic or phenetic relationship.

There have been suggestions to abandon the hierarchical contemporary classifications based on
the Linnaean system, which employs various fixed ranks in an established conventional sequence with a
‘phylogenetic taxonomy’ in which monophyletic groups would be unranked names, defined in terms of a
common ancestry, and diagnosed by reference to synapomorphies (de Queiroz and Gauthier, 1990;
Hibbett and Donoghue, 1998).

Classification not only helps in the placement of an entity in a logically organized scheme of
relationships, it also has a great predictive value. The presence of a valuable chemical component in one
species of a particular genus may prompt its search in other related species. The more a classification
reflects phylogenetic relationships, the more predictive it is supposed to be. The meaning of a natural
classification is gradually losing its traditional sense. A ‘natural classification’ today is one visualized as
truly phylogenetic, establishing monophyletic groups making fair use of the phenetic information so that
such groups also reflect a phenetic relationship (overall similarity) and the classification represents a
reconstruction of the evolutionary descent.