Unit 1.4

Question 1

Diversity

Answer 1

Depends on number of character states and also frequencies of those states

Question 2

Adaption

Answer 2

A characteristic that enhances the survival or reproduction of organisms that bear it, relative to alternative character states, in a specific environment

• evolved by natural selection
• feature can only be adaptive if we know what is adaptive for

Question 3

Natural selection

Answer 3

Any consistent difference in fitness among different classes of biological entities

Question 4

Fitness

Answer 4

Reproductive success
=number of offspring
- fitness components = survival + reproduction

Question 5

Evolution by natural selection occurs if

Answer 5

There is a correlation between an organisms phenotype and its fitness
Variation in phenotype is correlated between parents and offspring

Question 6

Natural selection in sexual populations

Answer 6

Entails change in frequencies of alleles that underlie phenotypic variation, which affects fitness

Question 7

Evolution is blind

Answer 7

Acts on standing variation

Question 8

Standing variation

Answer 8

Variation contained in a population in its current state, NOT the potential variation that could result from evolutionary forces

Question 9

Preadaption

Answer 9

A feature that fortuitously serves a new function

Question 10

Exaptation

Answer 10

Preadaptions that are co-opted for a new function during evolution

Question 11

How to recognize adaptions

Answer 11

Complexity
Design
Experiments
Comparative method