Unit: 1 Chapter: 2

Biological classification
• Biological classification has an ancient history from the beginning of human civilization.
Earlier simple concepts were used to classify organisms. Ex: food, shelter and clothing.
Aristotle in 350 B.C classified organisms based on simple morphological characters.
• He classified plants into trees, herbs and shrubs, whereas he classified animals into two
groups, one with red blood and other which did not have red blood.

Two kingdom classification

• In 1753, Carolus Linnaeus (father of taxonomy) classified organisms into Plantae

Consisting of plants and Animalia consisting of animals.
• This system did not include any evolutionary relationships. Different types of organisms
like birds, bats and insects were grouped together.
• Hence, this system of Classification which was used for very long time was inadequate.
• Later, along with the morphological character cell structure, nature of cell wall, mode of
nutrition, habitat, methods of reproduction evolutionary relationships etc were also
considered.

Five kingdom Classification

• In 1969 R H Whittaker classified all organisms into a five kingdom classification, namely
kingdom Monera, Protista, Mycota, plantae, Animalia.
• The main criteria were cell type, cell wall, nuclear membrane, body organization, mode
of nutrition, reproduction and evolutionary relationships.

Here

1. Plant kingdom includes only organisms which have cell wall in their cells.
2. Bacteria and the blue green algae which are prokaryotes are placed under separate
kingdom Monera, separating it from other Eukaryotes.
3. Unicellular chlamydomonas and multicellular Spirogyra were placed together under
Plantae as they both have characters of algae.
4. Fungi are placed under a separate kingdom Mycota, as their cell walls have chitin instead
of cellulose like in plants.
5. Prokaryotes are placed under one kingdom Monera.

The changes in the classification have happened over the time, because the Criteria of
classification have changed. It will also change in the future, due to our understanding of the
characters and evolutionary relationships between the organisms.
Characteristics of kingdom Monera.

1. Includes simple and primitive prokaryotes ex: bacteria, cyanobacteria.

2. Exhibits extreme habitats like hot springs, desserts, snow and deep oceans.
3. Many of them are parasites.
4. Bacteria can be differentiated based on their shapes. Spherical bacteria are called coccus
(plural Cocci), rod shaped as Bacillus (pl. Bacilli), Comma shaped as vibrium (pl. vibrio)
and the Spiral as spirillum (pl. Spirilla).
5. They have all nutrition like autotrophic, chemotrophic, saprophytic, parasitic, symbiotic
and heterotrophic.

Archaebacteria

• Initially, they were classified as bacteria, but due to this unique properties, they were
Classified separately under kingdom Monera.
• They are known to survive in extreme habitats Salty areas (halophiles), hot springs
(thermoacidophies) and marshy areas (methanogens).
• They have different cell wall with special lipids with glycerol linked to branched chain
hydrocarbons.
• Whereas in bacteria, glycerol is linked to fatty acids.
• Methanogens also inhabit the gut of ruminants (cow and buffaloes), which produces
methane (biogas) in their dung.

Eubacteria (Eu refers to true)

• Eubacteria or true bacterial cell is characterized by the presence of rigid cell wall and
flagellum.
• Autotrophic bacteria are called as cyanobacteria (commonly known as blue-green algae)
they have chlorophyll a, similar to plants.
• They also have similar characters to bacteria ex: Nostoc, spirulina, Anabaena. They are
single celled ex: Chroo coacus, exists in colonies ex: Microcystis and even filamentous
ex: Nostoc.
• They adapt themselves to grow is wide range of habitat. There are fresh water forms,
marine forms and terrestrial forms.
• The Colonial forms are usually protected by mucilagenous sheath. This helps the thallus
from getting dehydrated when the environment is dry.
• In fresh water ponds and lakes, which are polluted by nitrogenous compounds, the blue- -
green algae grow in large numbers creating water blooms. Such water emits odour and
becomes unfit for human use.
• Some of the cyanobacteria functions as biofertilizers, as they as fix nitrogen in a
specialized cells called heterocysts. ex: Nostoc and anabaena.
Chemosynthetic bacteria

• These bacteria use oxidize numerous type inorganic compounds. These exergonic
reactions release energy which is trapped in high energy biomolecules in the ATP
molecules. This energy is used to make organic molecules or nutrients from inorganic
molecules.
• They play a great role in recycling iron nutrients like nitrogen, phosphorous iron and
Sulphur.

Heterotrophic bacteria

• They are abundant or numerous in nature.

• They exhibit saprophytic nutrition and decompose dead plants and animals.
• Acts as natural scavengers by decomposing animal excreta: ex: cytophaga.
• Anaerobic respiration ration is shown in some bacteria, which brings about a process
Called fermentation. Fermentation is used in preparation of yogurt (curd) and cheese.
• Antibiotics are secondary metabolites produced by bacterial cells which can destroy other
microbes. The genus streptomyces has many species that produce different antibiotics.
• Bacteria play a major role in the nitrogen Cycle. Ex: Clostridium and Azotobacter are
free living soil bacteria which fixes nitrogen.
• Symbiotic bacteria Rhizobium present in the root nodules of leguminous plants.
• Bacteria are also responsible for harmful activities, causing damage to human beings,
animals and pets.
• The plant disease citrus canker in lemon, leaves and fruits, is caused by Xanthomonas
citri. Animal disease ex: Anthrax by Anthracis.
• It also causes human diseases like cholera, typhoid, tetanus etc.

Reproduction in bacteria

• Asexual reproduction occurs by binary fission and endospore formation.

• Binary fission is a cell division where the cellular components are divided into two parts.
• Endospore or spore formation takes place diving unfavorable conditions like dehydration,
nutrients absence and high temperatures.
• They show primitive type of reproduction, by transferring DNA from one bacterium to
another.

Mycoplasma

• They are the smallest known living cells.

 • The cells do not have cell wall, hence plasma membrane forms the outermost cellular
boundary.
• They survive in the atmosphere without oxygen.
• They are pathogenic and are known to cause disease in plants and animals ex potato
purple dwarf in potato plants. pleuroneumomia in human and Cattle.
•

KINGDOM PROTISTA

• The kingdom includes unicellular, eukaryotic, microscopic organisms which are mostly
aquatic.
• The kingdom Protista is a evolutionary link between prokaryotic monera and
multicellular kingdoms like Plantae, Mycota and Animalia.
• All protists have typical eukaryotic cell structure.
• They have true nucleus with nuclear membrane and nucleoli.
• Membrane bound organelles like true Vacuoles, mitochondria, plastids, lysosomes are
present.
• Locomotion of cells is by flagella, cilia, pseudopodia or wriggling of Cells.
• They reproduce sexually and asexually.
• Sexual reproduction takes place by cell fusion and zygote formation.

Classification of protista

• The protists can be grouped into three major groups

1. Photosynthetic protists → including chrysophytes, dinoflagellates and euglenoids.

2. Slime moulds are saprophytes.

3. Protozoans exhibits different model of nutrition like holozoic, saprophytic and parasitic.

Chrysophytes.

• They include phytoplankton (float passively in water currents) of marine and fresh water
ecosystems.
• This group includes diatoms and golden algae (desmids).
• The cells have different shapes like rectangular, circular or triangular.
• The Cell walls of diatoms form two thin overlapping shells, which closely fit each other
like soap box.
• Because of cell wall ornamentation, they called as ‘jewels of the plant world’.
• The cell walls are embedded by silica, making it indestructible.
• After the death of the diatoms, the cell wall gets deposited in their habitat. Accumulation
of cell wall over billions of years is referred to as ‘diatomaceous earth’.
 • Because of the gritty nature of the soil, the diatomaceous earth is used in polishing,
filtration of oils and syrups.
• Diatoms are the chief producers in the ocean.

Dinoflagellates

• Mostly marine in habitat and the main mode of nutrition is photosynthetic.

• They have cellulose containing Cell wall in the form of plates.
• They have two flagella (dinoflagellates), on one flagellum projects out longitudinally and
the other transversely in the furrow between the plates.
• They appear yellow (xanthophylls), green ∴ (chlorophyll), brown (fucoxanthin), blue
(phycocyanin) or the main red (Phycoerythrin) depending on the main pigments present
in it.
• Red dinoflagellates like Gonyaculax undergo rapid multiplication, and makes the whole
sea appear red.
• They release toxins, which can marine organisms kill other marine organisms.

Euglenoids

• They are mostly fresh water forms found water in stagnant water.
• They don't have cell wall, instead the cell is covered by a protein rich layer called
Pellicle. This makes the body of the animal very flexible.
• They have two flagella, one short and one long. In the presence of sunlight, they show
autotrophic nutrition.
• When deprived of Sunlight, they show heterotrophic nutrition by ingesting small sized
food particles via cytostome (cell mouth).
• They have pigments similar to higher plants. Ex: Euglena.

Slime mould

• They are saprophytic protists, found in terrestrial and aquatic habitats, living organic
matter as a source & good. Ex: physarum and dictyostelium.
• Under contain conditions, the cells together form an aggregation called as plasmodium..
This aggregation & plasmodium can spread and grow over several feet.
• During unfavorable condition, the plasmodium develops into fruiting bodies called
sporangia with spores.
• The plasmodium do not have true cell wall, they are mass of protoplasm containing many
nuclei whereas, and the spores possess true cell wall.
• They are extremely resistant and survive for many years, even under adverse conditions.
• The spores are dispersed by air currents.
Protozoans

• They are first group animals, believed to be primitive relatives of animals.

• All protozoans are as predators of heterotrophs and live as predators and parasites.
• They are classified into your major classes namely amoeboid, flagellated, ciliated and
Sporozoans.

Amoeboid protozoan

Ex: amoeba, Entamoeba and Elphidium.

• Habitat: They are aquatic found in both fresh and marine waters. Some of them live in
moist soil.
• Locomotion: They have pseudopodia false feet) which are temporary, blunt, cytoplasmic
projections.
• They even capture and engulf the food like algae and diatoms with pseudopodia.
• The marine forms have protective pellicle with silica. Ex:-Polystomella.
• Some of them are parasites living inside the body of other organisms (hosts) and absorb
nutrition Ex:-entamoeba.

Flagellated protozoans

Ex: Euglena, trypanosoma, Leishmania

• They may be free-living or parasitic. They have flagella for locomotion and to capture
food.
• The parasitic forms causes disease. Ex: trypanosoma causes sleeping sickness in human
beings.

Ciliated protozoans

Ex: Paramecium, vorticella:

• They are active, aquatic organisms.

• They have cilia, which are thousands in number for active locomotion.
• The coordinated movement of cilia, helps in movement of food into the gullet.
• Gullet is the cavity that open to the outside of cell surface.

Sporozoans

Ex: Plasmodium, gregarina.

• In sporozoans, the locomotory structures are absent.

 • Most of them are parasites. They have a spore-like infectious stage in their life Cycle,
Causing diseases in human population. Ex: Malaria is caused by plasmodium

Kingdom: Fungi / Mycota

• The species belonging to this kingdom are saprophytic, parasitic and rarely symbiotic as
in case of lichens and mycorrhizae. They show a great diversity and habitat in their
morphology and habitat.
• Fungi as food: Mushrooms are used as food. Yeast is used in the preparation of bread and
beer.
• The first antibiotic penicillin, was obtained from fungi Penicillium notatum.
• Fungi can grow on all kinds of food stuffs like bread, vegetables, and fruits. Ex bread
mould develops on bread, orange rots.
• Fungi infects plants and animals causing diseases in them. Ex: Puccinia Causes wheat
rust.
• Fungi occurs in air, water, soil and on Plants and animals. They prefer to grow in warm
and humid places

Fungal structure

• Yeasts are unicellular in their body organization.

• Remaining all fungi are filamentous, long, thread like structure called hyphae.
• Numerous hyphae are twined around one another do form mycelium.
• The hyphae which are cylindrical can be aseptate with many nuclei such hyphae are
called as coenocytic hyphae.
• The hyphae can also have septate with uninucleate of binucleate cells.
• The hyphae are attached to substratum rich in organic food by rhizoids, they absorb food
from the substratum.
• The cell wall of is composed of chitin and polysaccharide (fungal Cellulose).

Reproduction in fungi.

• Reproduction in fungi occurs by vegetative means like fragmentation, fission and

budding.
• Asexual reproduction occurs by formation of spores called conidiospores or
sporangiospores and zoospores.
• The spores are produced in a structure called fruiting body.
• Sexual reproduction takes place by oospores, ascospores and basidiospores. The sexual
reproduction takes place in 3 stages.
• Fusion of protoplasm between two gametes (motile or non-motile called as plasmogamy)
• Fusion of two nuclei called Karyogamy.
 • Meiosis results in haploid spores.
• The two haploid hyphae fuse and results in diploid cell (2n).
• In fungi ascomycetes and basidiomycetes and intermediate stage occurs, where in 2
nuclei per cell occurs (n+n). This condition is called dikaryon and the phase is called
dikaryophase. Later on, these nucleus fuse and the cells become diploid.
• These diploid cells undergo meiotic cell division (reduction division) in the fruiting
bodies, resulting in the formation of haploid spores.
• The division of kingdom mycota into various classes are based mode of on morphology
of the mycelium, spore formation and classification is follows.

Phycomycetes.

• They include primitive fungi.

• The thallus of the plaint body is cylindrical, aseptate, coenocytic hyphae with all
eukaryotic organelles.
• They are found in aquatic habitats, decaying wood, damp places and some of them are
obligate parasites on plants.
• Asexual reproduction takes place by the formation of spores in the structure called
Sporangia. Terrestrial species produces non-motile spores called as aplanospores.
Aquatic species produces motile spores called zoospores.
• Sexual reproduction takes place by fusion of the gametes which are similar in
morphology are called isogamy and dissimilar gametes are called as anisogamy or
oogamy.
• Some Common examples under this group Rhizopus (bread mould), Albugo (Parasitic
fungi).

Ascomycetes

Ex: Aspergillus, claviceps, Neurospora

• They are commonly referred to as sac fungi, as they produce a sac like structure during
sexual reproduction.
• Most of them are saprophytes. They decomposers. Those which grow on cow dung are
called as caprophilous. Some are Ascomycetes are Parasites. Rarely they are unicellular
Ex: Yeast (Saccharomyces).
• The mycelium is branched and septate.
• Asexual reproduction is by cell division and in yeast. In others, conidia forms budding in
at the tip of special hyphal Called Conidiosphores as in Penicillium and Aspergillus.
• Sexual reproduction takes place by formation of ascospores, inside a sac like structures
called and asci. The asci are arranged in different types & fruiting bodies called as
ascocarp.
 • Nourospora species are extensively used in biochemical and genetic some work.
• Species like morels and buffles are edible.

Basidiomycetes

• This class includes saprophytes like mushrooms bracket fungi, puffballs rust and smut
fungi and parasites.
• They grow in soil, on dogs, tree trunk and on plant bodies as parasites.
• The mycelium is branched and septate.
• Asexual reproduction is absent and vegetative reproduction is by fragmentation of the
thallus.
• Sexual reproduction: The sex organs are absent. But there is a sexual mechanism of
reproduction. When a strain or genotype mycelium fuse to form septate secondary
mycelium binucleate cells. Since each cell has two nucleus, the condition is called as
dikaryotic. During fusion of these cells, there is only fusion of cytoplasm or plasmogamy.
• The secondary mycelia grows in the rich organic substrata like bark of tree and produce
fruiting bodies called as basidiocarps. In the basidiocarps, basidia are developed. In
basidium, karyogamy takes place by the fusion of two nuclei to form diploid nucleus or
diploid zygote. This diploid nucleus undergoes meiotic or reduction division to form
haploid nuclei.
• Some common members of this group are Agaricus (mushroom), Ustilago (smut) and
Puccinia (rust fungus).

Deuteromycetes

• They are commonly known as imperfect fungi because sexual stage is not known.
• These fungi multiply by vegetative and asexual methods.
• Whenever, the perfect sexual stage is discovered the fungus is taken out placed in its
proper group out of deuteromycetes.
• Most of the deuteromycetes multiply asexually by conidia.
• The mycelium is septate and branched.
• Some members are saprophytes or parasites.
• Large number of members are decomposers of litter and help in mineral cycling. Ex :
Alternaria, Colletotrichum and trichoderma.

Viruses, Viroid and Lichens

• The whittaker's five kingdom classification does not explain about acellular organisms
like viruses, Viroid and lichens.
• Viruses are ultramicroscopic, non-cellular nucleoprotein particles with only one type
nucleic acid.
• They are obligate parasite, intracellular parasites in living host cells.
 • Viruses are combination of living and nonliving characters.
• The living features are: they have DNA or RNA & They can reproduce in living host.
They infect different types of host cells.
• The non-living features are: Absence of cellular organization. They are inert outside host
cells. Enzymes are absent. They can function only if a living host cell is available
• Discovery of virus: In 1892, Dmitri Iwanoski while studying tobacco mosaic disease,
recognized an infecting agent smaller than bacteria.
• He showed that when leaf extracts of infected tobacco plants were passed through
bacteria proof filters that could induce mosaic disease symptoms in healthy tobacco
plants.
• During 1898-1900, Beijerinck worked on tobacco mosaic plants and demonstrated that
filtered sap of infected tobacco plants could infect healthy tobacco plants. The bacteria
free filtrate was called (Contagium vivum fluidum).
• W. M. Stanley in 1935 showed that Viruses could be Crystallized and crystals consists
largely of proteins.
• Louis Pasteur coined the team virus.
• Structure: virus are made up of proteins and nucleic acids containing the genetic
material.
• Genetic material could be DNA or RNA
• No virus Contains both RNA and DNA.
• In general, viruses that infect plants have single stranded RNA.
• Viruses that infect animals have either single or double stranded RNA or double stranded
DNA.

Bacteriophages (viruses that infect the bacteria)

• They are double stranded DNA virus.

• The DNA present in the head region. The hand we made up of protein Coat Called
Capsid. Capsids are made of small subunits called capsomeres. The Capsomeres are
arranged in helical on polyhedral geometric forms.
• Virus causes human diseases like mumps, Smallpox, herpes and influenza.
• In plants they show symptoms like is are mosaic formation, leaf rolling and Curling,
yellowing and vein clearing, dwarfing and stunted growth.

Viroid:

• They are the smallest infectious pathogens known, consisting solely of short strands of
circular single stranded RNA without protein coats.
• They are mostly plant pathogens ex: potato spindle tuber disease.
 • The RNA of the viroid is of low molecular weight.

Lichens

• Lichens are symbiotic associations between algae and fungi. The algal part is called
phycobiont. It provides food for fungi part. The fungus is called mycobiont. They provide
shelter and absorb mineral nutrients and water for algae.
• Lichens are very good pollution indicators, they do not grow in polluted areas.

Prions

• It is the proteinaceous infecting particles lacking nucleic acid.

• It causes disease Creutzfeldt Jacob disease.