Clade
A clade from organisms that are monophyletic – that is, composed of a common ancestor in addition to all its lineal descendants – on a phylogenetic tree. Rather than the English term, the equivalent Latin term cladus plural cladi is often used in taxonomical literature.
The common ancestor may be an individual, a population, or a species extinct or extant. Clades are nested, one in another, as regarded and identified separately. branch in restyle splits into smaller branches. These splits reflect evolutionary history as populations diverged in addition to evolved independently. Clades are termed monophyletic Greek: "one clan" groups.
Over the last few decades, the cladistic approach has revolutionized biological types and revealed surprising evolutionary relationships among organisms. Increasingly, taxonomists attempt to avoid naming taxa that are not clades; that is, taxa that are non monophyletic. Some of the relationships between organisms that the molecular biology arm of cladistics has revealed include that fungi are closer relatives to animals than they are to plants, archaea are now considered different from bacteria, and multicellular organisms may clear evolved from archaea.
The term "clade" is also used with a similar meaning in other fields besides biology, such(a) as Cladistics § In disciplines other than biology.