Fungus - Taxonomy

Taxonomy

Unikonta

Amoebozoa


Opisthokonta

Animalia



Choanozoa





Nucleariids




Rozellida


Fungi

Microsporidia




Chytridiomycota



Neocallimastigomycota




Blastocladiomycota



Zoopagomycotina



Kickxellomycotina



Entomophthoromycotina



Mucoromycotina



Glomeromycota


Dikarya

Ascomycota



Basidiomycota








Although commonly included in botany curricula and textbooks, fungi are more closely related to animals than to plants and are placed with the animals in the monophyletic group of opisthokonts. Analyses using molecular phylogenetics support a monophyletic origin of the Fungi. The taxonomy of the Fungi is in a state of constant flux, especially due to recent research based on DNA comparisons. These current phylogenetic analyses often overturn classifications based on older and sometimes less discriminative methods based on morphological features and biological species concepts obtained from experimental matings.

There is no unique generally accepted system at the higher taxonomic levels and there are frequent name changes at every level, from species upwards. Efforts among researchers are now underway to establish and encourage usage of a unified and more consistent nomenclature. Fungal species can also have multiple scientific names depending on their life cycle and mode (sexual or asexual) of reproduction. Web sites such as Index Fungorum and ITIS list current names of fungal species (with cross-references to older synonyms).

The 2007 classification of Kingdom Fungi is the result of a large-scale collaborative research effort involving dozens of mycologists and other scientists working on fungal taxonomy. It recognizes seven phyla, two of which—the Ascomycota and the Basidiomycota—are contained within a branch representing subkingdom Dikarya. The below cladogram depicts the major fungal taxa and their relationship to opisthokont and unikont organisms. The lengths of the branches in this tree are not proportional to evolutionary distances.

Read more about this topic:  Fungus