Question

Taxonomic key is one of the taxonomic tools in identification and classification of plants and animals. It is used in the preparation of
A. Monographs
B. Flora
C. Both (a) and (b)
D. None of these

Answer 1

Hint:- A taxonomic key is a set of contradicting statements/characters that enables a person to identify an organism of unknown phylogeny. Taxonomic keys constitute an important tool in studying and constructing evolutionary phylogenetic trees.

Complete step-by-step solution:-
Taxonomic keys are tools that help us to classify organisms, construct phylogenetic trees, and identify unknown species of plants and animals.
A monograph is a text that contains details of any taxon. Monographs typically review and present all known species of a taxon. Any new species that has been discovered can be added to the respective taxon. A monograph is an excellent tool to understand associations of the species of that taxon with the environment, morphological variations within a group or family. Monographs can be constructed using taxonomic keys.
Flora is the plant species present in an area. Flora of a region may contain known species and unknown species. The unknown species of a flora may be characterized using a taxonomic key.
To conclude, we can say that taxonomic keys can be used in construction of flora and monographs. Hence, option (c) is correct.

Additional Information:
Taxonomic keys are essentially devices that help the users to identify unknown species of plants and animals. Keys contain a series of characters, generally morphological, that help users to classify the unknown species into groups, families and phyla. A key, at each step answers a question with the help of two contradicting features. While using a key, the user must go through all the points present properly. Since the construction of monographs or the study of flora are based on observations of characters presented in the taxonomic key, correct interpretation of taxonomic keys is very important.

Note:- Taxonomic tools are important to study phylogenetic relationships between organisms. Species are identified based on the similarities or dissimilarities of the species with the character documented in the key. Taxonomic keys can be used to construct monographs that are a detailed morphological analysis of a taxon or identification of unknown plant species in a flora.