Heredity
The study of how traits pass from parents to offspring.
What are Genetics?
English naturalist who wrote 'On The Origins of Species' (1859) after his voyage to the Galapagos Islands. His observations were crucial to his development of the theory of evolution by natural selection.
Who was Charles Darwin?
A structural adaptation that enables a species to blend in with its environment.
What is camouflage?
3-D structure of DNA, resembling a twisted ladder.
What is a double helix?
The capital of North Carolina.
What is Raleigh?
Austrian monk who discovered the basic principles of genetics. He conducted groundbreaking experiments with pea plants in the mid-1800s.
Who is Gregor Mendel?
A genetic factor that is blocked by a dominant factor. For example, if purple flowers are dominant to white flowers.
What is a Recessive trait?
Slight differences in inherited traits.
What are variations?
A change in the nucleotide sequence of a gene caused when a mistake happens during DNA replication.
What is a mutation?
A period with below average precipitation.
What is a drought?
When an organism's genotype has two identical alleles for a trait (YY, yy)
What is a Homozygous genotype?
The different forms of a gene.
What is an allele?
An inherited trait that increases an organism's chance of surviving and reproducing in a particular environment.
What is an adaptation?
The full name for DNA.
What is Deoxyribonucleic acid?
A model that shows the probability of all possible genotypes and phenotypes of an offspring
What is a Punnett Square?
The observable characteristics or traits of an organism
What is a Phenotype?
The cross between two individuals that are hybrids for one trait
What is a Monohybrid Cross?
Organisms with certain traits that help them hide from predators and locate prey, to survive longer and reproduce more effectively. These advantageous traits become more common over generations.
What is Natural Selection?
The process of copying a DNA molecule to make another DNA molecule. One of the steps involves unwinding the DNA double helix, to separate the two strands.
What is DNA replication?
When an organism makes an exact copy of itself without needing a partner. There is no genetic variation among the offspring. The advantages include efficiency and speed. The disadvantage, without genetic variation, a population cannot evolve in response to changing environment, or a disease.
What is asexual reproduction?
A now-discredited theory that proposed that offspring inherit traits as a mix or average of their parents' traits, similar to how colors blend. The offspring of a tall and a short individual would be of medium height. This hypothesis was ultimately disproven by Mendel's experiments.
What is the blending inheritance hypothesis?
The offspring of breeding parents with different forms of the same trait. Plant-father with white flowers is bred with plant-mother with purple flowers.
What is a hybrid cross?
A crucial feature of vertebrate development in the face or neck of all vertebrates, including humans and fish, but in modified forms. For fish, they form the gills. For humans, they form glands that regulate calcium.
What are pharyngeal pouches?
A type of nucleic acid that carries the code for making proteins out of the nucleus to the ribosomes.
What is RNA?
A unit of energy that represents the amount of energy transferred when a force of one newton moves an object one meter in the direction of the force. Equivalent to one newton-meter.
What is a joule?