Wikipedia:How to read a taxobox

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

This article explains how to read a taxobox. If you want to create or edit taxoboxes, see Wikipedia:WikiProject Tree of Life/taxobox usage. For discussion, see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life.

Taxoboxes are tables setting out the currently accepted scientific classification of an organism or group of organisms. As of 2005, there are more than 10,000 taxoboxes in the English Wikipedia.

Please refer to the figure on the right, showing the taxobox from the article Colorado potato beetle.

1. The title of the box is a common English name for the organism, if any, or else the scientific name.
2. For many species, this line gives the conservation status of the species — an indicator of the likelihood of that species continuing to survive. The Colorado potato beetle is "Secure": there is no immediate threat to the survival of the species. For species under threat, Wikipedia follows the status given on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.
3. A picture of a typical individual.
4. The central section of the taxobox sets out the currently accepted scientific classification of the organism or group of organisms described by the article. This is the hierarchy of groups, called "taxa" (singular: taxon), to which the organism belongs. In cases where the taxonomy is uncertain, in dispute, or currently undergoing a revision, this section attempts to represent current, but conservative, scientific consensus, and does not usually attempt to follow the very latest research.
5. On the left of the classification are the "ranks" of the taxa that are named on the right. A species is a population of related individuals that share a more or less distinctive form and are capable of interbreeding. It is included in a genus (a group of related species), which is included in a family (a group of related genera) and so on. Normally the seven "major ranks" appear as shown here, but in cases where more detail is appropriate, "minor ranks" may appear as well. For example, a subfamily may appear between family and genus.
6. The binomial name or "binomen" is the currently accepted scientific name for a species. It consists of the name of the genus followed by a "specific epithet". Binomial names must be chosen so that no two organisms have the same name; this means that scientists can use Leptinotarsa decemlineata to refer to the Colorado potato beetle without ambiguity. Biologists maintain codes of nomenclature to ensure uniqueness; see International Code of Zoological Nomenclature for the rules followed by zoologists. Binomial names are written in Latin, or other languages transliterated into Latin. (This has its origin in the science of the 18th century when the binomial system was popularized, when scientific publication was most often in Latin.) In the case of the Colorado potato beetle Leptinotarsa is Latinized Greek meaning "delicate feet"; decemlineata is Latin, meaning "ten-striped".
7. Below the binomial name is the authority for that name — the first person to publish the name together with a description of the organism (or a reference to such a description). In this case the name Leptinotarsa decemlineata was first used by US naturalist Thomas Say (1787–1843) in the first volume of his American Entomology, or Descriptions of the Insects of North America, published in 1824. The lack of parentheses around the name is a convention meaning that the species remains in the genus to which Say assigned it. (Parentheses would indicate that the species is now considered to belong to a different genus.)
8. The species appears again in abbreviated form. Above the species are the "higher taxa" to which it belongs:
9. The genus Leptinotarsa contains more than 30 species of beetle, the most well-known being the Colorado potato beetle and the False potato beetle, Leptinotarsa juncta.
10. Chrysomelidae is the famliy of leaf beetles. This family contains more than 35,000 described species of plant-eating beetles.
11. Coleoptera is the order of beetles, containing more than 350,000 described species. Beetles have a pair of hard wing-cases (elytra) which cover their true wings.
12. Insecta is the class of insects, containing more than 800,000 described species. Insects have three segments (a head, a thorax, and an abdomen) and six legs.
13. Arthropoda is the phylum of arthropods, which have a segmented body, jointed legs and a hard exoskeleton.
14. Animalia is the kingdom of animals, which are multicellular, generally capable of locomotion and responsive to their environment.

It should be emphasized that the scientific classification of an organism is a scientific hypothesis. It may be confirmed or refuted by new evidence. A new study may demonstrate that the Colorado potato beetle is not a single species, but a group of very closely related but separate species; perhaps a cryptic species complex. A taxonomist may look in detail at the species in the family Chrysomelidae and propose a new classification splitting that family into several smaller ones.