Tree Thinking
A taxon that includes a common ancestor and all of its descendants.
What is a monophyletic group?
A trait shared by two taxa because of common ancestry rather than convergent evolution
What is a homologous trait?
In bryophytes, this generation is dominant and photosynthetic.
What is the gametophyte generation?
The evolutionary innovation that allowed plants to transport water efficiently and increase in height.
What is vascular tissue?
Darwin referred to the rapid diversification of flowering plants by this phrase.
What is the abominable mystery?
Two taxa share a recent common ancestor not shared by any other taxa on the tree. These taxa are known as this.
What are sister taxa?
A group containing an ancestor but excluding some descendants.
What is a paraphyletic group?
The diploid multicellular stage that produces spores by meiosis.
What is the sporophyte?
This structure protects the embryonic sporophyte and is retained within maternal tissue in seed plants.
What is the seed?
Double fertilization in angiosperms produces an embryo and this nutritive tissue.
What is endosperm?
If a character evolves independently in two unrelated lineages due to similar selective pressures, it is considered this.
What is an analogous trait?
The branching point on a phylogenetic tree representing a common ancestor.
What is a node?
In ferns, meiosis occurs within this structure on the sporophyte.
What is the sporangium?
Gymnosperms differ from angiosperms because gymnosperm seeds are this.
What are naked seeds?
This angiosperm innovation increased pollinator specificity and reproductive efficiency.
What is the flower?
A phylogenetic tree constructed using DNA sequences rather than morphology relies on this type of data.
What is molecular data?
A group composed of organisms that do not share an immediate common ancestor but are grouped together based on superficial similarities.
What is a polyphyletic group?
The transfer of sperm to the egg without requiring free-standing water was made possible by this innovation.
What is pollen?
Seedless vascular plants differ from bryophytes because the dominant life stage is this.
What is the sporophyte?
The earliest angiosperms are thought to have evolved from this major plant lineage.
What are gymnosperm-like ancestors?
A tree in which branch lengths represent the amount of evolutionary change is known as this.
What is a phylogram?
f birds are excluded from reptiles despite sharing a common reptilian ancestor, reptiles become this type of group.
What is paraphyletic?
A moss sperm cell would most likely fail to reach the egg under these environmental conditions.
What are dry conditions?
The adaptive advantage of heterospory is that it promotes this major evolutionary trend.
What is the evolution of the seed habit?
This tissue in angiosperms transports sugars and organic compounds throughout the plant.
What is phloem?