Living things II. Biodiversity.

The term “biodiversity” refers to the variety of life forms in a habitat, whether it’s a local environment or an entire planet. Most of the species making up our planetary biodiversity are still poorly studied or completely unknown.

Check the presentation about biodiversity on Earth. Do you think it has been always the same?

Biodiversity on Earth from irenebyg

Why is biodiversity son important? Why should we care about a single species? We have many more left... Well, this video explains causes and consequences of bees extinction.




All organisms on Earth: biodiversity.

Think about a bacterium and a frog. They don't resemble each other, but both are living things. Remember: all organisms share three characteristics:

• 1. We carry out 3 vital functions.

• 2. We are made up of the same chemical substances.

• 3. We are made up of cells.

But, as we said, there are other many differences between them too.

As we are many species on Earth, humans have classify all organisms in groups, from the "biggest" one (the biggest one you are studying) KINGDOM, to the smallest one SPECIES.

Today we are learning some characteristics of living things, and how we classify them.

TAXONOMIC SYSTEM

What are the main taxonomic groups?
Use Wikipedia to find out what taxonomy is.

--> KINGDOM
-->
-->
-->
-->
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--> SPECIES

Write an example from Animal kingdom to Homo sapiens species.

What do we use to include organisms in one group or other?