Concepts 6.1-6.3 (Evolution)

Question 1

What does a molecular clock tell us?

Answer 1

The average rate at which a given gene or protein accumulates changes can be used to gauge the time of divergence for a particular split in the phylogeny

Question 2

What are the different types of phylogeny trees?

Question 4

What does a molecular clock tell us?

Answer 4

The average rate at which a given gen or protein accumulates change can be used to gauge the time of divergence for a particular split in the phylogeny.

Question 5

What are the different types of phylogeny trees?

Answer 5

• Cladogram
• Pylogram
• Ultrametric

Question 6

What does the slope on a molecular clock represent?

Answer 6

An average rate of change in amino acid sequences

Question 7

What is an adaptive trait?

Answer 7

A particular structure, physiological process, or behaviour that makes an organism better able to survive and reproduce.

Question 8

How can adaptive traits arise?

Answer 8

mutation, hybridisation

Question 9

How does population structure arise?

Answer 9

When demographic processes produce systemic differences in allele frequencies between subsets of a larger population

Question 10

Why do branch lengths differ on phylogenetic tree?

Answer 10

• Different amounts of change of amino acids
• Any of the agents of change could be acting

Question 11

Why do different proteins develop at different rates?

Answer 11

• Needs to use co-factors
• Co-factor won’t fit in protein if amino acid sequence changes (constraint)