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Chapter 10
Fossil | The preserved remains of an ancient animal. |
Catastrophism | The idea that conditions and organisms on Earth change in quick, violent events. |
Uniformitarianism | The geologic processes that occur today are similar to those that have occurred in the past. |
Carbon film | The fossilized carbon outlined of an organism or part of an organism. |
Mold | The impression in a rock left by an ancient organism. |
Cast | A fossil copy filled with sediment or mineral deposits. |
Trace fossil | The preserved evidence of the activity of an organism. |
Paleontologist | Scientists that study fossils. |
Relative age | The age of rocks and geologic features compared with other rocks and features nearby. |
Superposition | The principle that in undisturbed rock layers, the oldest rocks are on the bottom. |
Inclusion | A piece of older rock that becomes part of new rock. |
Unconformity | A surface where rock has eroded away, producing a break, or gap, in the rock record. |
Correlation | Matching rocks and fossils from separate locations. |
Index Fossil | Species that existed on the Earth for a short length of time, were abundant, and inhabited many locations. |
Absolute age | The numerical age, in years of a rock or object. |
Isotope | Atoms of the same element that have different numbers of neutrons. |
Radioactive decay | It is the process by which an unstable element naturally changes into another stable element. |
Half-life | The time required for half of the parent isotopes to decay into daughter isotopes. |