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Encyclopedia of Estuaries pp 35–37Cite as

Archaea

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Part of the book series: Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series ((EESS))

Synonym

Archaebacteria

Definition

Archaea constitute one of the three domains of life, as phylogenetically distinct from the domains Bacteria and Eukarya (Woese and Fox, 1977; Woese et al., 1990).

Etymology

Archaea (singular: archaeon) are derived from Greek ἀρχαῖος – ancient, primitive.

The term was coined to reflect the apparent antiquity of traits in archaeal species and their aptness to inhabit environments like those presumed for early Earth.

Phylogeny

On the phylogenetic tree of organisms, Archaea form one of the three fundamental branches called domains (Woese et al., 1990). Further branching within the archaeal domain is largely based on ribosomal RNA sequences, but also relies on evidence from comparative analysis of protein sequences. Typical markers in archaeal phylogeny are ribosomal proteins, histones, and components of the transcription system and the cell division apparatus (Brochier-Armanet et al., 2011). In addition to the initially recognized phyla Crenarchaeota and...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Microbiology and Center for Ecology, Southern Illinois University Carbondale, 1125 Lincoln Drive, Carbondale, IL, 62901, USA

    Antje Rusch

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  1. Antje Rusch
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Antje Rusch .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA

    Michael J. Kennish

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© 2016 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

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Rusch, A. (2016). Archaea. In: Kennish, M.J. (eds) Encyclopedia of Estuaries. Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-8801-4_287

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