Evolution 1
What is embryology?
A fossil dating technique that uses radioisotopes such as carbon-14 and uranium-238.
What is radiometric dating (absolute dating)?
The variable that the scientist deliberately changes and is the focus of the investigation.
What is the independent variable?
A cloud of dust and gas in space.
What is a nebula?
The name of the competing theory for the origins of the universe that was disproven. (expanding with even universe density)
The process where organisms with traits better suited to their environment are more likely to survive.
What is natural selection?
The collection of fossils of the scientific community that document the evolutionary changes of species.
What is the fossil record?
The correct type of graph to use when observing a relationship between two continuous sets of data. (e.g. growth height vs time)
What is a line graph? (or scatter plot)
The Milky Way's type of galaxy.
What is a spiral galaxy?
The type of telescope Mr O'Dea brought to class.
What is an optical telescope?
A type of evolution where two species independently develop similar traits e.g. sharks and dolphins
What is convergent evolution.
The species with which humans share our most recent common ancestor.
What are chimpanzees?
A way to judge and improve the reliability of an investigation.
What is repeating the experiment?
The type of radiation that allows us to 'see' into nebula and gather information about the birth of stars. (collected by very large telescopes)
What are radio waves.
The distance to the nearest star to Earth (other than our sun - rounded to the nearest light year)
What is 4.24 light years. (4 ly accepted)
When a population is reproductively isolated from others, leading to genetic divergence over time until they can no longer interbreed.
Two species of organism we viewed as videos that showed examples of evolutionary process at work.
What are Galapagos finches, Caribbean anole lizards or whales?
The dependent variable for an investigation into how paper plane wingspan affects time of flight.
What is time of flight?
The current stage of stellar evolution of our sun.
What is main sequence?
Artificial light at night, which disrupts the view of the cosmos.
What is light pollution?
The two trends observed in the fossil record.
What are increasing biodiversity and increasing organism complexity.
The limb that is shared among all mammals and is an example of comparative anatomy.
What is the pentadactyl limb?
The investigation is reliable, accurate measurements are taken, appropriate equipment is selected, all necessary variables are controlled, a control group has been utilised if needed.
What are the criteria for a valid investigation?
An explanation of one piece of evidence that supports the Big Bang Theory.
1. Observed red shift of stellar spectrum indicating that universe is currently expanding (hence it used to be more dense).
2. CMBR (cosmic microwave background radiation) that is the afterglow of the initial plasma stage of the Big Bang universe.
The common name for the constellation 'Crux'.
The southern cross.