Brilliant Barnacles

This module uses barnacles, small filter feeding marine crustaceans that fix themselves on rocks and boats, as the basis for students to learn the principles of classification, taxonomy and phylogeny.

Darwin took eight years to study every known fossil and living barnacle and his work forms the basis upon which the serious study of barnacle classification and evolution has been based.

In this module students will study barnacle morphology, life histories and life styles as Darwin did. He based his classification and search for a common ancestor upon his studies. Recent work using genetic and molecular evidence and scanning electron microscopy shows how some of the key difficulties in drawing the phylogenetic tree of barnacles have been resolved very recently by systematists and how some new questions have been raised.

Artemia, the brine shrimp, is used to explore the body plan of arthropod crustaceans and to understand how the taxonomic hierarchy is worked out through simple microscope work.

All of the Brilliant Barnacles resources are stored on our Google Drive which you can access by clicking here. You can download the resources individually below.