Organism of choice: Helenium virginicum S.F. Blake

The outline format: your outline must be formatted as described and exemplified in the example attached.

The required elements: Your outline should contain the following elements in this order:

I. The Introduction: this section must contain

A. The scientific name of your organism.

B. The common name of your organism. What do most people know it as? Are there other names?

C. The area of residence in which you and your organism are (country/state/city).

D. The specific biome of where your organism lives. Please see here for more details on biomes.

II. The Body: this section should contain

A. Background: include a general physical description of your organism.

B. Life Cycle: describe the life cycle of your organism. The life cycle refers to the series of changes that happens from the beginning of life as your organism develops and grows into a mature organism. Please see here for some hints on the Life Cycle. Note that some organisms (like plants) have a more complex life cycle than an animal does. If you have any questions on this please ask!

C. Structure and Function: please select one organ system of your organism that you find to be particularly interesting and describe both the anatomy and physiology of that system.

b. If your organism is a plant, here are a list of the general plant organ systems

D. Evolution: Evolution is best understood as heritable change over time, or descent with modification. Please be sure to discuss the evolution of your organism using the following guidance:

a. Conduct a review of scientific literature to understand what is known about the evolution of your chosen organism. Search key words like evolution, fossil, ancestor. Also, refer back to your results from Assignment 1.

b. Conduct a review of scientific literature to understand the family tree or phylogeny of your organism. Phylogeny is defined as the history of organismal lineage as they change through time. Search key words like phylogeny, phylogenetic and genetic analysis.

c. Use the Tree of Life Project, which can be found here, to help you identify the lineage and related species. In addition, here is a list of other useful websites that focus on evolution:

Evolution: What is life's History on Earth?

Biointeractive: Evolution

Evidence: How Do We Know What We Know?

Evolutionary Biology

NOVA Evolution

Species and Speciation

Understanding Evolution

Your Inner Fish

E. Additional Interests: The diversity of biological organisms is vast and interesting! Identify at least one unique fact or behavior not covered in the life cycle, structure/function or evolution and discuss it. For example, does your organism have an interesting parental care strategy or mating system? What about an adaptation or co-dependence with another species?

III. Conclusion section: this section should contain four to six bullet points that sum up the main points from the outline.

A. Start your conclusive section with one sentence summarizing some basic information about your chosen organism (name and geographical distribution).

B. Continue with a brief summary (1-2 sentences) about the life cycle and any particular body structures.

C. Include a brief note about its evolutionary path.

D. Include a brief summary (1-2 sentences) about the ecological role of your chosen organism in its ecosystem.

E. Wrap up the conclusive section with a closing note that provides brief information about a unique fact and/or behavior of your chosen organism.