Author Description

The goal of the symposium on which these proceedings are based was to reach a consensus on the hierarchy of life. In some well studied areas, there is a good agreement between molecular data and morphology, for example among vertebrates and insects. In other well studied groups, such as birds and bacteria, fundamental disagreements reported in these proceedings may result from the use and interpretation of different methods. All these points were discussed during the meeting, and several problem areas were also indentified - resulting in new ideas and plans for future work in this field."