Natural Selection
This process causes populations to adapt and evolve through differential reproductive success.
What is natural selection?
Similarities in DNA sequences support this idea.
What is common ancestry?
A characteristic that improves an organism’s ability to survive and reproduce.
What is an adaptation?
A severe environmental change can cause this to happen to a species.
What is extinction?
A tool used to identify organisms using paired statements.
What is a dichotomous key?
A change in DNA that can introduce variation into a population.
What is a mutation?
Organisms with these traits are more likely to survive and reproduce
What are favorable (beneficial) traits?
Structures like a whale’s flipper and a human arm are examples of these.
What are homologous structures?
Camouflage is an example of this type of adaptation.
What is a structural adaptation?
This human activity removes forests and changes habitats.
What is deforestation?
These diagrams show evolutionary relationships among organisms.
What are cladograms (or phylogenetic trees)?
The number of times a trait appears in a population over time.
What is frequency?
A population of insects becomes harder to kill after repeated spraying.
What is pesticide resistance?
The remains or traces of ancient organisms found in rock layers.
What is the fossil record?
Migration and hibernation are examples of this type of adaptation.
What is a behavioral adaptation?
When environmental changes lead to the formation of a new species.
What is speciation?
The first word in scientific nomenclature identifies this classification group.
What is the genus?
Bacteria surviving antibiotic treatments is an example of this type of resistance.
What is antibiotic resistance?
This happens when populations are separated by barriers like rivers, mountains, or islands.
What is geographic isolation?
Tiny hind leg bones in whales are examples of these structures.
What are vestigial structures?
Individuals best suited to an environment are more likely to do these two things.
What are survive and reproduce?
Overfishing can decrease the size of these.
What are populations?
Organisms that share a more recent common ancestor are placed this way on a cladogram.
What is closer together?
The variety of traits within a population.
What is genetic variation?
The four major conditions required for natural selection are overproduction, inherited variation, limited resources, and this.
What is the struggle to survive (competition)?
Similar early development stages in different organisms provide this type of evidence for evolution.
What is embryological evidence?
Over many generations, favorable traits become more common because of this process.
What is evolution by natural selection?
If environmental change happens too quickly, species may not be able to do this.
What is adapt?
The two-part naming system used by scientists worldwide.
What is binomial nomenclature?
Natural selection acts on this level of organization rather than on individuals.
What are populations?