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What does variation mean in a population?
Differences between individuals of the same species.
What is an adaptation?
A feature that helps an organism survive and reproduce in its environment.
What is meant by survival of the fittest?
The best-adapted individuals survive and reproduce.
Name one type of adaptation in animals.
For example, thick fur in animals living in cold places.
Why is variation important for natural selection to occur?
Because it provides different traits, and some may help survival better than others.
How is the camel adapted to the desert and how does it help survival?
A camel’s fat in its hump stores energy, helping it survive when food is scarce.
What happens to individuals that are not well adapted to their environment?
They are less likely to survive and reproduce.
What is meant by the term offspring?
The young or babies produced by living organisms.
Explain how a polar bear’s white fur is an adaptation.
It helps camouflage the bear in snow, protecting it from predators and helping it hunt.
How can natural selection lead to changes in a population over time?
Helpful traits become more common as better-adapted individuals reproduce.
Why can environmental changes cause some species to become extinct?
Because their adaptations may no longer help them survive in the new conditions
A giraffe with a longer neck survives better in dry seasons. Explain why.
It can reach leaves higher up when food is rare, so it survives and reproduces more.
How does mutation contribute to variation in a population?
Mutations create new traits that can be passed to offspring
Describe how natural selection could lead to antibiotic resistance in bacteria.
Bacteria with resistance survive treatment, reproduce, and pass the resistant genes on.
Explain why not all variations in a population are helpful.
Some variations don’t improve survival or may even reduce fitness.
How can DNA sequence similarities show that two species are closely related?
Species with more similar DNA share a more recent common ancestor.