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evolution
Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. TERM 2
species
DEFINITION 2 In biology, a species complex is a group of closely related species that are very similar in appearance to the point that the boundaries between them are often unclear. TERM 3
fossils
DEFINITION 3 Fossils are the preserved remains or traces of animals, plants, and other organisms from the remote past. TERM 4
catastrophism
DEFINITION 4 Catastrophism is the theory that the Earth has been affected in the past by sudden, short-lived, violent events, possibly worldwide in scope. TERM 5
gradualism
DEFINITION 5 Gradualism, from Latin gradus, is a hypothesis, a theory or a tenet assuming that change comes about gradually or that variation is gradual in nature.
uniformitarianism
Uniformitarianism is the assumption that the same natural laws and processes that operate in the universe now have always operated in the universe in the past and apply everywhere in the universe. TERM 7
variation
DEFINITION 7 differences in physical traits of an individual from the group to which it belongs. TERM 8
adaptation
DEFINITION 8 In biology, an adaptation, also called an adaptive trait, is a trait with a current functional role in the life of an organism that is maintained and evolved by means of natural selection. TERM 9
artificial selection
DEFINITION 9 Selective breeding is the process by which humans use animal breeding and plant breeding to selectively develop particular phenotypic traits (characteristics) by choosing which typically animal or plant males and females will sexually reproduce and have offspring together. TERM 10
heritability
DEFINITION 10 Heritability is a statistic used in breeding and genetics works that estimates how much variation in a phenotypic trait in a population is due to genetic variation among individuals in that population.
analogous structure
body part that is similar in function as a body part of another organism but is structurally different. TERM 17
vestigial structure
DEFINITION 17 Vestigiality refers to genetically determined structures or attributes that have lost some or all of their ancestral function in a given species, but have been retained during the process of evolution. TERM 18
paleontology
DEFINITION 18 study of fossils or extinct organisms.
