What does cladogram mean?
A cladogram is a branching diagram that depicts the evolutionary relationships among a group of organisms. Used chiefly in cladistics, it arranges species or other taxa so that organisms sharing a more recent common ancestor appear closer together. Each branching point, or node, represents an inferred common ancestor, while the tips represent living or extinct descendants. Unlike a phylogram, a cladogram does not indicate how much evolutionary change occurred along each lineage — only the pattern of relatedness itself. Biologists construct cladograms from shared derived characteristics such as anatomical features, DNA sequences, or behavioral traits, and they are fundamental to modern taxonomy and comparative biology. The word combines 'clade', meaning a group descended from a single ancestor, with the suffix '-gram', denoting something written or drawn. Cladograms are standard tools in textbooks, research papers, and museum exhibits, helping scientists communicate hypotheses about life's history at a glance.
nounA branching diagram used in cladistics to show the evolutionary relationships among species or other taxa, in which each branch point represents a inferred common ancestor.
- A branching diagram depicting the evolutionary relationships among taxa based on shared derived characters, where each node represents a common ancestor.
"The researchers constructed a cladogram to illustrate how closely related the two bird species were."
"The cladogram showed that whales share a more recent common ancestor with hippos than with any other group shown."
"Students learned to read a cladogram by identifying which traits appear along each branch."
Regular English plural.
"Several competing cladograms were proposed before molecular data settled the question."
Every fork on a cladogram marks a moment when one ancestral lineage split in two — making it, in effect, a family tree for all of life.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of cladogram
The word 'cladogram' was coined in the 1960s within the field of cladistics, a school of biological systematics founded by German entomologist Willi Hennig in the mid-20th century. It combines 'clade' — from Greek 'klados' (κλάδος), meaning 'branch' — with '-gram', from Greek 'gramma', meaning something written or drawn. Cognate scientific terms include 'cladistics', 'cladogenesis', and 'phylogram'.
Related word forms
How cladogram is actually used
A technical term used primarily in biology and paleontology; plural 'cladograms'. Often contrasted with phylogram and phenogram. The term derives from 'clade' (from Greek 'klados', branch) plus '-gram' (something drawn/written).
Easily confused with cladogram
A phylogram is similar but has branch lengths proportional to evolutionary change or time, whereas a cladogram's branches show only topology.
A phenogram clusters organisms by overall similarity, whereas a cladogram reflects hypothesized shared ancestry.