Systematics and the Origin of Species from the Viewpoint of a Zoologist is a book written by zoologist and evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr

Ernst Mayr

Ernst Walter Mayr was one of the 20th century's leading evolutionary biologists. He was also a renowned taxonomist, tropical explorer, ornithologist, historian of science, and naturalist...

 that was first published in 1942. The book became one of the canonical publications on the modern evolutionary synthesis

Modern evolutionary synthesis

The modern evolutionary synthesis is a union of ideas from several biological specialties which provides a widely accepted account of evolution...

.

Based on Mayr’s Jesup Lectures delivered at Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

 in 1941, the book combines concepts of zoology and genetics and features Mayr's biological species concept

Species

In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring. While in many cases this definition is adequate, more precise or differing measures are...

. The biological species concept developed by Mayr defines a species in terms of biological factors such as reproduction

Biological reproduction

Reproduction is the biological process by which new "offspring" individual organisms are produced from their "parents". Reproduction is a fundamental feature of all known life; each individual organism exists as the result of reproduction...

, taking into account ecology, geography, and life history; it remains an important and useful idea in biology, particularly for animal speciation.

In December 2004 the National Academy of Sciences

United States National Academy of Sciences

The National Academy of Sciences is a corporation in the United States whose members serve pro bono as "advisers to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine." As a national academy, new members of the organization are elected annually by current members, based on their distinguished and...

held a colloquium in honour of Mayr's 100th birthday. Systematics and the Origin of Species: On Ernst Mayr's 100th Anniversary was also published in commemoration.

Contents

1. The Methods and Principles of Systematics
2. Taxonomic Characters and Their Variation
3. Phenomena of Geographic Variation
4. Some Aspects of Geographic Variation
5. The Systematic Categories and the New Species Concept
6. The Polytypic Species, in Nature and in Systematics
7. The Species in Evolution
8. Nongeographic Speciation
9. The Biology of Speciation
10. The Higher Categories and Evolution