Unit 9 terms for vocab quiz Flashcards
Spontaneous generation
the supposed production of living organisms from nonliving matter, as inferred from the apparent appearance of life in some supposedly sterile environments
Endosymbiosis theory
some eukaryotic cell organelles, such as mitochondria and plastids, evolved from free-living prokaryotes
Artificial Selection
evolutionary process in which humans consciously select for or against particular features in organisms
Natural selection
process through which populations of living organisms adapt and change
Homologous structure
similar physical features in organisms that share a common ancestor, but the features serve completely different functions
Analogous structure
features of different species that are similar in function but not necessarily in structure and which do not derive from a common ancestral feature
Vestigial structure
feature that a species inherited from an ancestor but that is now less elaborate and functional than in the ancestor
Mimicry
Mimicry occurs when one species of animal (the mimic) resembles another species that has easily recognizable characteristics (the model)
Genetic drift
Genetic drift is the change in frequency of an existing gene variant in the population due to random chance.
Founder effect
the reduced genetic diversity which results when a population is descended from a small number of colonizing ancestors.
Bottle neck
A thriving population gets reduced due to little genetic diversity but than makes a comeback
Gradualism
theory that changes of organic life and of the Earth itself occur through gradual increments
Punctuated equilibrium
the hypothesis that evolutionary development is marked by isolated episodes of rapid speciation between long periods of little or no change
Hardy-Weinberg principle
the genetic variation in a population will remain constant from one generation to the next in the absence of disturbing factor
Derived trait
those that just appeared (by mutation) in the most recent ancestor
