Example Lab Report

Introduction
A major theme across all areas of biology is that of classification. Organisms are grouped according to shared characteristics at many different levels. The biolocal classification systems consists of seven traditional levels. These levels are Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, and Species. A nemonic device to help remeber the classification system is: King Phillip Came Over for Good Soup. Athough there are seven traditional levels to the classification system, many of the levels are broken down into super and sub levels for further differentiation.

Experimental Plan
This lab will examine the classification of a single organism in order to gain a better understanding the biological classification system. The organism will be identified at all seven levels and the some of the distinguishing characteristics of each of the levels will be explored.

Observations and Data

The organism I chose for this lab was the sugar maple. The classification is shown below

Common Name: Sugar Maple

Kingdom: Plantae

Sub Kingdom Tracheobionta (Vascular plants)

Phylum/Division Magnoliophyta (flowering plants)

Class: Magnoliopsida (dicotyledons)

Order: Sapindales

Family: Aceraceae

Genus: Acer

Species: Acer Saccharum (2 varieties)

The Kingdom Plantae is made up of multicelluar organisms that produce food through photosynthesis.
The Sub Kingdom Tracheobionta contains all vascular plants. A vascular plant is any plant containing food-conducting tissues (the phloem) and water-conducting tissues (the xylem). These include ferns and seed-bearing plants but not mosses or algae.
The Phylum Magnoliophyta contains all flowering plants also known as angiosperms.
The Order Sapindales is an order of mostly woody dicotyledonous plants in the subclass Rosidae with compound or lobed leaves and polypetalous, hypogynous to perigynous flowers with one or two sets of stamens.
The Family Aceraceae is a family of flowering plants also called the Maple Family. It contains two to four genera, depending upon the circumscription, of some 120 species of trees and shrubs. A common character is that the leaves are opposite, and the fruit a schizocarp.^[1]
The Genus Acer is a group of trees and shrubs commonly referred to as maple. Plants in this genus have opposite, palmately lobed and veined leaves (Acer negundo has compound leaves ). Fruits are winged schizocarps (samaras) .
The Species Acer saccharum refers the the common sugar maple of which there are two recognized varieties.

Discussion and Conclusion
This lab helped me to learn more about a tree that I see on a daily basis. I also learned about some of the characteristics used to differentiate the maple tree from other trees and plants.

Bibliography/References
List here any websites or publications used.