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chapter 10
Vocab Words
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Fossil | Preserved remains or evidence of ancient living things |
| Catastrophism | Idea that conditions and organism on earth change in quick, violent events |
| Uniformitarianism | Stages that geologic processes that occur today are similar to those that have occured in the past |
| Carbon Film | The fossilized carbon outline of an organism or part of an organism |
| Mold | The impression in a rock left by an ancient organism |
| Cast | Fossil copy of an organism made when a mold of the organism is filled with sediment or mineral deposit |
| Trace Fossil | Pressed evidence of the activity of an organism |
| Paleontologist | Scientist who study fossil |
| Relative Age | The age of rocks and geologic features compared with other rocks |
| Superposition | The principle that in undisturbed rock layers, the oldest rocks are on the bottom |
| Inclusion | Piece of an older rock that becomes part of a 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 earth for a short lenght of time, were abundant, and inhabited many locations |
| Absolute Age | Numerical age in years of a rock or object |
| Isotope | Atoms of the same element that have different numbers of neurons |
| Radioactive Decay | Process by which an unstable atomic nucleus loses energy by radiation |
| Half-Life | Time required for half of the parent isotopes to decay into daughter isotopes |