Biosystematics and Taxonomy

"This book provides classical as well as modern information about taxonomy, the science of classifying and naming animals and plants. Biological systematics is the study of the diversification of living forms, both past and present, and the relationships among living things through time. Relationships are visualized as evolutionary trees. Phylogenies have two components, branching order and branch length. Systematic biology is the field that provides scientific names for organisms, describes them, preserves collections of them, provides classifications for the organisms, keys for their identification, and data on their distributions."