This paper aims to discuss thescientific climate of Algal taxonomy, mainly the difficulties in the presentand past, as well as the reasons these difficulties have remained over time andwhy taxonomy is a crucial discipline. Naming and classifying algal speciesholds many merits.

It allows for the conservation of biodiversity, the understandingof ecosystems, and new perspectives on models of ecology pertaining to algae. Discoveringand classifying biodiversity should be a priority now more than ever before.Since, the biota of the earth has greatly shifted causing extinction for asmany as twenty-seven thousand species. The rate at which species are beingdescribed has undergone no change since the middle of the 19th century.Nevertheless, the overall rate of the description of algae since the beginningof algal taxonomy has seen a gradual increase. The same can be said for thenumber of taxonomists in the world today, which has also seen a great increase.One of the largest barriers for algal taxonomists is the number of species theyare uncertain about the status of. It’s even been estimated that there are72,500 species of which only 44,000 have been classified.

Leaving a sum of 28,500species of algae unaccounted for. Another issue is DNA taxonomy, its fast-pacednature allows taxonomists to generate gene sequences faster than they canproperly describe the species in question, leaving many species as unnamedsequences. DNA taxonomy also lead to the discovery of even more cryptic species,making naming and classifying more and more complex. All these issues contributeto the phenomenon known as the dead weight of the past. The dead weight of thepast is a hefty list of issues that surround algal taxonomy and detertaxonomists from attempting to fix or continue to organize and classifyspecies.  The most important thing toderive from this paper is the importance of taxonomy for the conservation ofour natural world and that only with team work and a solid plan can we continueto do great work in the field of algal taxonomy despite present issues.