Animal Phyla are There
How many animal phyla are there?
Under the most often used grouping scheme, there are 38 animal phyla. Certain systematicists claim there are a different number of phyla, although always between 35 and 40. The following phyla of multicellular animals are usually included in general biology courses. Remember that the botanical counterpart of a phylum is called a division. Unicellular animals are usually placed in the kingdom Protista along with the divisions of unicellular and multicellular algae.
Every phylum is monophyletic, meaning it considers all the relatives of a single species, and no species that are not descendants of those so-called stem taxa. This can be supported through genetic analysis. There remains disagreement as to how many of these phyla existed prior to the Cambrian explosion, during the Ediacaran period, though most scientists agree that at least eight were already established.
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