Throughout history, many figures, including philosophers and biologists such as Aristotle, Carlos Linnaeus, Ernst Haeckel, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, among many others, dedicated long years of their lives to give an exact classification of all forms of life that were known in those times, on planet earth. In this article you will learn more about The 5 Kingdoms of Nature.
The 5 Kingdoms of Nature
Aristotle classified all the animals that we all know today in one of his most recognized works, which is called "The history of animals", on the other hand, his disciple Theophrastus, dedicated his life to classifying all types of floors. Building on the earlier work of Aristotle and Theophrastus, Carl Linnaeus can better form "Animalia" and "Vegetabilia" as the first two kingdoms of nature; In addition to this, he was the creator of very basic taxonomic classifications such as "Order", "Class", "Species" and "Genus". It should be noted that Carlos Linnaeus also proposed minerals as a third kingdom, which would be completely discarded over time.
Now, in the case of Ernst Haeckel, he brought the Plantae, Protista, and Animalia kingdoms to the table. However, many other scientists reduced the number of these kingdoms to two, and even many others came to propose between four and even seven kingdoms. In spite of this, with the advances in science during all these years, all the considerations of the scientists of past times were taken into account, to finally conclude in what today we can call «The 5 kingdoms».
When referring to the five kingdoms, we must know that we are talking about any living creature that exists in some corner of planet earth. All the organisms that exist are grouped mainly taking into account their shared characteristics. The first classification given to organisms is their domain, to place their species in any of the three taxa, which are archaea, eukaryotes, and bacteria.
Despite this, many people consider "life" before domain, the same to ratify that we are talking about an organism, which has the ability to be born, grow, metabolize, reproduce, and finally, die; apart from other questions that can corroborate the life of this organism. After determining the life and dominion of the organism, the kingdom continues. In order to determine this without failing, a series of cell studies are needed, which will show which of the five kingdoms it belongs to.
In the case of animals, it is very easy to differentiate them from plants, however, in the case of microscopic organisms, it is much more difficult to adequately determine which of the five kingdoms they belong to.
Animalia Kingdom
Within this kingdom we can find the most numerous living organisms of all, the animals. Kingdom which, of course, includes all human beings. Regarding the taxonomy of animals, different categories are included such as: Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Suborder, Family, Subfamily, Genus, and finally Species; despite these, there are different animals such as humans that can have more categories. In the taxonomy of the human being, we can observe categories such as: Subkingdom, Subphylum, Superphylum, Infraphylum, Superclass, Infraorder, Parvorden, Superfamily, Tribe, and finally Subtribe.
Within the subkingdoms found in the Animalia kingdom, we can find the Eumetazoa kingdom and also the Parazoa kingdom. In the case of the first mentioned, its members obtain the name of Eumetazoans, the main characteristics of these organisms is to have true tissues which are organized in germ layers, as well as the presence of neurons and that of an embryo which passes through the gastrulation stage, that is, a very early stage of embryonic development.
On the other hand, we find that the members of the Parazoa subkingdom are called Parazoa, unlike the Eumetazoa, their main characteristic is the absence of any tissue itself, which are also called connective tissue. Due to this same condition, these organisms totally lack any muscle, internal organs, or even any nerve. A magnificent example of the Parazoa are the sponges.
After different scientific studies, at least 30 members of the Animalia kingdom are officially recognized, in addition to two large groups which are separated by their body plan, these are the vertebrates and invertebrates; It is worth mentioning that in the case of invertebrates, they are the ones with a much more abundant population.
A very important fact about invertebrates is that insects are the main representatives of this group, primarily ants, since these small insects have a population throughout the world of approximately 100.000 billion ants.
Kingdom Plantae
In the case of the great kingdom Plantae, vascular and non-vascular plants are included. This kingdom also includes, of course, liverworts, mosses, horsetails, lycopods, hornworts of Anthocerotophyta, spermatophytes, ferns, angiosperms, and also gymnosperms.
Regarding the taxonomy of this kingdom, you can find divisions and supervisions that are divided according to the different characteristics of these plants, these include everything from mosses or even duckweed, to giant trees such as sequoias. Despite the enormous variety that this kingdom possesses, each and every one of the plants, without exception, is eukaryotic and multicellular.
After much research and scientific studies, it was determined that plants as we know them today have evolved from aquatic ancestors, ancestors which over time migrated to all land areas, which also varied in multiple biomes at different temperatures, altitudes, and geological compositions.
All the representatives of this extensive kingdom have a great role in each living being on planet earth, since they are responsible for the maintenance and development of life as we know it. Plants primarily use the energy from the Sun, to later be able to convert it into organic chemical energy using photosynthesis, although it should be noted that not all plants use photosynthesis to obtain their energy, a great example of this is the Gastrodia kuroshimensis, which is a species of plant that is found mainly in the Asian continent.
fungi kingdom
In this kingdom we can group all types of fungi, and different microorganisms such as mold and yeast. All fungi are heterotrophic organisms, which obtain their food and energy through the absorption of different dissolved molecules. These organisms also differ greatly from the other kingdoms by having an exclusive cell wall with a combination of glucans and chitin. which are elements that we can easily find in animals and plants, however, unlike fungi, these two have them separately and in different parts of their structure.
All the organisms of this kingdom are the main decomposers of all ecological systems, which brings great benefits. Many of these organisms usually live on the land surface, and many others in the water; It is worth mentioning that many organisms belonging to this kingdom also have a very close parasitic or symbiotic relationship with some plants and animals.
To date, at least 99.000 organisms belonging to the fungi kingdom are officially known, however, a large number of scientists suggest that they may actually exist, at least 1.5 million around the world. Within the official figure, approximately 70 types of bioluminescent fungi have been registered, among these fungi we can find Mycena chlorophos and Panellus stipticus.
This kingdom is usually closely related to leafy forests; Despite this, yeasts could even be in our kitchen, and also mold can appear very easily if we leave any type of decomposing food in our kitchen.
Kingdom Monera
Within this kingdom we must include all kinds of bacteria, archaebacteria and cyanobacteria, previously called "blue-green algae", which should not be confused at all with the green algae that are clearly part of the Plantae kingdom.
All those that make up the Monera kingdom have a prokaryotic organization, since these organisms totally lack a cell nucleus that is differentiated through a membrane, as well as other internal structures. The organisms of this kingdom live practically in all the environments that exist on Earth: depths and terrestrial surfaces, deep seas, and also, in the digestive tracts of human beings, despite the fact that not all bacteria are harmful to the organism. .
According to a varied number of scientists and researchers, there are different bacteria such as Lactobacillus casei, which greatly help the correct functioning of the system. The vast majority of scientists in the world agree that bacteria were the main precursors of life on planet Earth, this insinuation is due to the fact that bacteria are believed to have been present on the planet for at least three quarters of its history, and which in turn, have been able to adapt to each and every one of the changes that the Earth has undergone throughout its long history.
In addition to this, recently the existence of a group of bacteria that can live even under the ice, in a lake located in Antarctica, the same lake which is subjected to climates of up to -13 degrees Celsius, and also in waters with very high concentrations of salt, sulfur, nitrous oxide, ammonia, not to mention the almost total absence of light and oxygen.
protist kingdom
Within the Protista kingdom is where we can find all those organisms that are eukaryotes, organisms which cannot be found in any other eukaryotic kingdom. Many of these organisms are unicellular, many others multicellular, and there is another group of syncytial organisms, which indicates that they have a cell with several nuclei, which is the result of a fusion of many cells.
One of the most outstanding characteristics of the members of the Protista kingdom is the presence of flagella (which are also present in all bacteria) that serve as an impulse for their movement. In smaller numbers, many protists use pseudopodia, which are also used in locomotion for phagotrophic feeding.
These organisms can manifest themselves in the form of colonies, filaments, or also cenobibias, even not all these organisms are microscopic. A great example of the latter are the brown or pheophyceae algae, which usually reach up to 60 meters in length and are members of this kingdom. However, on average, the measurements of protist organisms are usually between 1 μm (which means a micrometer, which in turn equals 0.001 millimeters) and approximately 3 millimeters.
The Kingdom of Viruses
Due to the great complexity of these microorganisms, it is not known exactly to which kingdom they belong. In fact, it is not even known exactly if viruses are living organisms, or if they are simply elements that cause a reaction in fungi, animals, plants, and even bacteria, archaea, and of course humans. In fact, there are many viruses that attack each other.
The most interesting thing about viruses is that they can multiply easily and they are not cells, despite this, viruses enter cells to absorb all their energy or to replicate. For this same reason, officially until now, viruses are only biological entities.
If you want to learn much more about the fauna of the world and the different species of animals, you cannot leave without first reading these three wonderful articles: