Page 66 - General and Inorganic Chemistry for Advanced Secondary Schools Students Book Form Five and Six

Biology for Secondary Schools

Table 4.2: Classification of some common organisms
Taxonomic unit Human being Cat Maize plant
Kingdom Animalia Animalia Plantae

Phylum/Division Chordata Chordata Angiospermophyta
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Class Mammalia Mammalia Monocotyledoneae
Order Primate Carnivora Graminales

Family Hominidae Felidae Poaceae
Genus Homo Felis Zea

Species Homo sapiens Felis catus Zea mays

Note that the names of higher ranks As an example, the scientific name of a
(above species) always start with a human being is Homo sapiens. ‘Homo’
capital letter. For example, the human is the generic name and ‘sapiens’ is
being is in kingdom Animalia, phylum the specific epithet. Scientific names
Chordata, class Mammalia, order of some other common organisms are
Primate, family Hominidae, genus shown in Table 4.3.
Homo, and species Homo sapiens.
Rules of binomial nomenclature
Binomial nomenclature The following rules are observed when
Task 4.4 writing scientific names.

Search from the library and reliable (a) All scientific names must be
internet sources the information about written in Latin language or if is
naming of organisms. in a different language, the name
must be Latinised.
Binomial nomenclature is a scientific (b) The name should have two parts;
system of naming organisms using the first part represents the genus
a two-part name. The first part of the and the second part represents the
name represents the genus. It is also specific epithet.
called the generic name. The second (c) The generic name is written before
part of the name represents the specific the specific epithet.
epithet. The two parts form the name (d) The generic name must start with
of a species or scientific name. This a capital letter and specific epithet
system was first introduced by Carl begins with a small letter.
Linnaeus, who is also referred to as the (e) In published documents, such as
father of classification. books, scientific names should

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