BIOPL 4450 - [History of Systematic Botany]

(PBS)

Fall. 3 credits.

Next offered 2015-2016. (Offered every four years)

J. Reveal.

An historical overview from early man to the present day of systematic botany concentrating on nomenclature and classification with an emphasis of botanical explorations and their impact on plant taxonomy.

Outcome 1: The purpose of the course is to examine the historical development of systematic botany, or the identification, naming, and classification of plants as used by people over the last 10,000 years, by putting into context not only the development of botany up to 1859, but also the development of phylogenetic systematics. The goal is to allow students to evaluate and effectively interpret present-day systematic by gaining an appreciation of past knowledge to better arrive at a defensible conclusion of the ultimate expression of modern systematic, the binomial set in an evolutionary context.