cladistic

/kləˈdɪstɪk/
adjective
  1. Relating to a method of classifying living things based on common ancestry and evolutionary relationships.
    • In biology class, we learned about cladistic classification systems.
    • Scientists used cladistic methods to build the new family tree of flowering plants.
    • The cladistic analysis showed that birds are more closely related to dinosaurs than to reptiles.
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