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fossil record words
vocabulary words
| words | definition |
|---|---|
| abiotic / physical factors | non--living factors such as erosion , wind and sun exposure |
| benthic | living at the bottom of the ocean or on the ocean floor |
| biological / biotic factors | living factors such as decomposers , scavengers and predators |
| body fossil | body parts of organisms that become fossils , such as bones , teeth , skin , leaves , tree trinks |
| cast | cast are formed when sediment leakes into a mold and hardens to form a copy of the original structure |
| compression | fossil formed when an organism is flattened { compressed } , leaving a dark stain in the rock |
| coprolite | fossilized feces |
| decomposer | an organism that breaks down the tissue and / or structures of dead organisms |
| erosion | weathering or wearing away of rock and earth { and any fossils they contain } caused by wind, sun, and / or water |
| fossil | the natural remains of traces of past life . something is considered to be a fossil if it is at least 10,000 years old |
| fossil record | all of the fossils that have existed throughout life's history , whether they have been found or not |
| groundwater | water found underground as a result of rainfall , ice and snow malet , submerged rivers , lakes ,and springs |
| ichnology | the study of trace fossils |
| igneous rock | type of rock produced when molten magma { lava } cools and solidifies |
| inorganic | not containing carbon not from living things. ex , mineral |
| impression | fossilized prints or marks made by a living thing. leaf prints , skin prints and footprints are good examples |
| intertidal | the coastal zone between the low and high tide mark where waves impact the land |
| metamorphic rock | rock produced when any type of rock is changed by heat , pressure , and chemical activity in the earth |
| mineralization | the process whereby living material is replaced with minerals |
| mold | the impression of an organism left behind in the rock |
| paleontology | the study of life in the past |
| paleontologists | are people who study fossils and other types of evidence to learn about life in the past |
| plate tectonics | the concept that explains the movement of the earth's crustal plates , sea floor spreading and a number of other geologic processes of the earth's surface |
| rock cycle | the process through which one type of rock { igneous , sedimentary , or metamorphic } is converted into another |
| scavenger | an organism that feeds on dead and dying organisms |
| sedimentary rock | rock that formed when layers of small particles { sediment } are compressed and cemented together |
| trace fossil | evidence left by organisms such as burrows, imprints , coprolites , or footprints |
| uplift | the process that causes part of the earths crust to rise above surrounding areas this can cause layers of rock to become exposed at the surface |
| relative age | its age compared to the ages of other rocks |
| absolute age | of a rock is that number of years since the rock formed |
| law of superposition | to determine the relative ages of sedimentary rock layers |
| extrusion | lava that hardens on the surface |
| intrusion | there the magma cools and hardens into a mass of igneous rock |
| fault | is a break in earths crust |
| unconformity | the surface where new rock layers meet a much older rock surface beneath them |
| inclusion | is a piece of rock that contained in another rock |
| index fossil part 1 | a fossil must be widely distributed and represent a type of organism that existed only briefly |
| index fossil part 2 | are useful because they tell the relative ages out of the rock layers in which they occur |
| determine relative age | geologists also study extrusion and intrusions of igneous rock fault gaps in the geologic record and inclsion |
| extrusion | at surface youngest |
| intrusion | below surface = younger than bottom surface |