|
Acacia Heterophylla
''Acacia heterophylla'', the highland tamarind,Forestry Abstracts, University of Oxford Commonwealth Forestry Bureau, p.327, 1939 is a tree (or shrub in its higher places) endemic to Réunion island where it is commonly named ''tamarin des hauts'' The tree has a juvenile stage where its leaves have a pinnate arrangement, but in the adult stage the leaves diminish and the phyllode becomes the dominant photosynthetic structure. It has been introduced into Madagascar where it grows in a subhumid climate at an altitude of about 500–1000 m above sea level. Genetic sequence analysis has shown its closest relative is ''Acacia koa'' of Hawaii; the estimated time of divergence is about 1.4 million years ago. ''A. heterophylla'' sequences nest within those of the more diverse ''A. koa'', making the latter species paraphyletic. Both species are descended from an ancestral species in Australia, presumably their sister species, '' Acacia melanoxylon''; the means of dispersal to Hawaii and t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jean-Baptiste Lamarck
Jean-Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet, chevalier de Lamarck (1 August 1744 – 18 December 1829), often known simply as Lamarck (; ), was a French naturalist, biologist, academic, and soldier. He was an early proponent of the idea that biological evolution occurred and proceeded in accordance with Naturalism (philosophy), natural laws. Lamarck fought in the Seven Years' War against Prussia, and was awarded a commission for bravery on the battlefield. Posted to Monaco, Lamarck became interested in natural history and resolved to study medicine.#Packard, Packard (1901), p. 15. He retired from the army after being injured in 1766, and returned to his medical studies. Lamarck developed a particular interest in botany, and later, after he published the three-volume work ''Flore françoise'' (1778), he gained membership of the French Academy of Sciences in 1779. Lamarck became involved in the Jardin des Plantes and was appointed to the Chair of Botany in 1788. When the French Nationa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Gilbert Baker
John Gilbert Baker (13 January 1834 – 16 August 1920) was an English botanist. His son was the botanist Edmund Gilbert Baker (1864–1949). Biography Baker was born in Guisborough in North Yorkshire, the son of John and Mary (née Gilbert) Baker, and died in Kew. He was educated at Quaker schools at Ackworth School and Bootham School, York. He then worked at the library and herbarium of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew between 1866 and 1899, and was keeper of the herbarium from 1890 to 1899. He wrote handbooks on many plant groups, including Amaryllidaceae, Bromeliaceae, Iridaceae, Liliaceae, and ferns. His published works includ''Flora of Mauritius and the Seychelles''(1877) and ''Handbook of the Irideae'' (1892). He married Hannah Unthank in 1860. Their son Edmund was one of twins, and his twin brother died before 1887. John G. Baker was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1878. He was awarded the Veitch Memorial Medal of the Royal Horticultural Society in 1907. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Endemism
Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsewhere. For example, the Cape sugarbird is found exclusively in southwestern South Africa and is therefore said to be ''endemic'' to that particular part of the world. An endemic species can be also be referred to as an ''endemism'' or in scientific literature as an ''endemite''. For example '' Cytisus aeolicus'' is an endemite of the Italian flora. '' Adzharia renschi'' was once believed to be an endemite of the Caucasus, but it was later discovered to be a non-indigenous species from South America belonging to a different genus. The extreme opposite of an endemic species is one with a cosmopolitan distribution, having a global or widespread range. A rare alternative term for a species that is endemic is "precinctive", which applies to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Réunion
Réunion (; french: La Réunion, ; previously ''Île Bourbon''; rcf, label= Reunionese Creole, La Rényon) is an island in the Indian Ocean that is an overseas department and region of France. It is located approximately east of the island of Madagascar and southwest of the island of Mauritius. , it had a population of 868,846. Like the other four overseas departments, Réunion also holds the status of a region of France, and is an integral part of the French Republic. Réunion is an outermost region of the European Union and is part of the eurozone. Réunion and the fellow French overseas department of Mayotte are the only eurozone regions located in the Southern Hemisphere. As in the rest of France, the official language of Réunion is French. In addition, a majority of the region's population speaks Réunion Creole. Toponymy When France took possession of the island in the seventeenth century, it was named Bourbon, after the dynasty that then ruled France. To break ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Madagascar
Madagascar (; mg, Madagasikara, ), officially the Republic of Madagascar ( mg, Repoblikan'i Madagasikara, links=no, ; french: République de Madagascar), is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately off the coast of East Africa across the Mozambique Channel. At Madagascar is the world's List of island countries, second-largest island country, after Indonesia. The nation is home to around 30 million inhabitants and consists of the island of Geography of Madagascar, Madagascar (the List of islands by area, fourth-largest island in the world), along with numerous smaller peripheral islands. Following the prehistoric breakup of the supercontinent Gondwana, Madagascar split from the Indian subcontinent around 90 million years ago, allowing native plants and animals to evolve in relative isolation. Consequently, Madagascar is a biodiversity hotspot; over 90% of wildlife of Madagascar, its wildlife is endemic. Human settlement of Madagascar occurred during or befo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Acacia Koa
''Acacia koa'' or commonly known as koa is a species of flowering tree in the family Fabaceae. It is endemic to the Hawaiian Islands, where it is the second most common tree. The highest populations are on Hawaii, Maui and Oahu. Name The name ''koa'' in the Hawaiian language ultimately comes from Proto-Austronesian *''teRas'' meaning "core" or "ironwood"; many names referring to certain ironwood or heartwood species in Southeast Asia and Oceania such as ''Vitex parviflora'' (''tugás'' in Cebuano), ''Eusideroxylon zwageri'' (''togas'' in Tombonuwo), and ''Intsia bijuga'' (''dort'' in Palauan) descend from this root. ''Koa'' also means brave, bold, fearless, or warrior. Description Koa is a large tree, typically attaining a height of and a spread of . In deep volcanic ash, a koa tree can reach a height of , a circumference of , and a spread of . It is one of the fastest-growing Hawaiian trees, capable of reaching in five years on a good site. Leaves Initially, bipinnat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Paraphyletic
In taxonomy (general), taxonomy, a group is paraphyletic if it consists of the group's most recent common ancestor, last common ancestor and most of its descendants, excluding a few Monophyly, monophyletic subgroups. The group is said to be paraphyletic ''with respect to'' the excluded subgroups. In contrast, a monophyletic group (a clade) includes a common ancestor and ''all'' of its descendants. The terms are commonly used in phylogenetics (a subfield of biology) and in the tree model of historical linguistics. Paraphyletic groups are identified by a combination of Synapomorphy and apomorphy, synapomorphies and symplesiomorphy, symplesiomorphies. If many subgroups are missing from the named group, it is said to be polyparaphyletic. The term was coined by Willi Hennig to apply to well-known taxa like Reptilia (reptiles) which, as commonly named and traditionally defined, is paraphyletic with respect to mammals and birds. Reptilia contains the last common ancestor of reptiles a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sister Species
In phylogenetics, a sister group or sister taxon, also called an adelphotaxon, comprises the closest relative(s) of another given unit in an evolutionary tree. Definition The expression is most easily illustrated by a cladogram: Taxon A and taxon B are sister groups to each other. Taxa A and B, together with any other extant or extinct descendants of their most recent common ancestor (MRCA), form a monophyletic group, the clade AB. Clade AB and taxon C are also sister groups. Taxa A, B, and C, together with all other descendants of their MRCA form the clade ABC. The whole clade ABC is itself a subtree of a larger tree which offers yet more sister group relationships, both among the leaves and among larger, more deeply rooted clades. The tree structure shown connects through its root to the rest of the universal tree of life. In cladistic standards, taxa A, B, and C may represent specimens, species, genera, or any other taxonomic units. If A and B are at the same taxonomic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Acacia Melanoxylon
''Acacia melanoxylon'', commonly known as the Australian blackwood, is an ''Acacia'' species native in South eastern Australia. The species is also known as Blackwood, hickory, mudgerabah, Tasmanian blackwood, or blackwood acacia. The tree belongs to the ''Plurinerves'' section of ''Acacia'' and is one of the most wide-ranging tree species in eastern Australia and is quite variable mostly in the size and shape of the phyllodes. Description The tree is able to grow to a height of around and has a bole that is approximately in diameter. It has deeply fissured, dark-grey to black coloured bark that appears quite scaly on older trees. It has angular and ribbed branches The bark on older trunks is dark greyish-black in colour, deeply fissured and somewhat scaly. Younger branches are glabrous, ribbed and angular to flattened near the greenish coloured tips. The stems of younger plants are occasionally hairy. Like most species of ''Acacia'' it has phyllodes rather than true leaves ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Petrel
Petrels are tube-nosed seabirds in the bird order Procellariiformes. Description The common name does not indicate relationship beyond that point, as "petrels" occur in three of the four families within that group (all except the albatross family, Diomedeidae). Having a fossil record that was assumed to extend back at least 60 million years, the Procellariiformes was long considered to be among the older bird groupings, other than the ratites, with presumably distant ties to penguins and loons. However, recent research and fossil finds such as ''Vegavis'' show that the Galliformes (pheasants, grouse and relatives), and Anseriformes (ducks, geese) are still not fully resolved. Known species All the members of the order are exclusively pelagic in distribution—returning to land only to breed. The family Procellariidae is the main radiation of medium-sized true petrels, characterised by united nostrils with medium septum, and a long outer functional primary feather. It is dom ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ecological Niche
In ecology, a niche is the match of a species to a specific environmental condition. Three variants of ecological niche are described by It describes how an organism or population responds to the distribution of resources and competitors (for example, by growing when resources are abundant, and when predators, parasites and pathogens are scarce) and how it in turn alters those same factors (for example, limiting access to resources by other organisms, acting as a food source for predators and a consumer of prey). "The type and number of variables comprising the dimensions of an environmental niche vary from one species to another ndthe relative importance of particular environmental variables for a species may vary according to the geographic and biotic contexts". See also Chapter 2: Concepts of niches, pp. 7 ''ff'' A Grinnellian niche is determined by the habitat in which a species lives and its accompanying behavioral adaptations. An Eltonian niche emphasizes that a spec ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
.jpg "Click for more on -> Endemism")
.svg "Click for more on -> Réunion")
.png "Click for more on -> Sister Species")
