Evolution Flashcards
Natural Selection
Traits for their environment and survive/reproduce more
Lamarck’s Hypothesis
A theory of evolution based on the principle that physical changes in organisms during their lifetime
Adaptation
a change or the process of change by which an organism or species becomes better suited to its environment
Evolution
the process by which different kinds of living organisms are thought to have developed and diversified from earlier forms during the history of the earth
Gene flow
any movement of individuals, and/or the genetic material they carry, from one population to another
Genetic drift
variation in the relative frequency of different genotypes in a small population, owing to the chance disappearance of particular genes as individuals die or do not reproduce
Nonrandom mating
occurs when the probability that two individuals in a population will mate is not the same for all possible pairs of individuals
Hardy-Weinberg principle
The Hardy-Weinberg theorem characterizes the distributions of genotype frequencies in populations that are not evolving, and is thus the fundamental null model for population genetics
Vestigial Structures
retention during the process of evolution of genetically determined structures or attributes that have lost some or all of the ancestral function in a given species
Homologous Structures
Homologous structures are similar structures that evolved from a common ancestor
Analogous Structures
Analogous structures are structures that are similar in unrelated organisms
Favorable Phenotype
positive set of observable characteristics of an individual resulting from the interaction of its genotype with the environment
Speciation
the formation of new and distinct species in the course of evolution
