Term | Definition |
fossil record | made up of all the fossils ever discovered on Earth |
mold | the impression of an organism in a rock |
cast | a fossil copy of an organism in a rock. |
trace fossil | the preserved evidence of the activity of an organism |
geologic scale | the chart that divides Earth's historyinto different time units |
biological evolution | the change over time in populations of related oranisms |
extinctions | occurs when the last individual organisms of a species dies |
naturalist | a person who studies plants and animals by observing them |
variation | a slight difference in an inherited trait of individual members of a species |
natural selection | the process by which populations of organisms with variations that help them survive in their environments live longer, compete better and reproduce more than those that do not have the variation |
adaptation | an inherited trait that increases an organism's chance of surviving and reproducing in its environment |
camouflage | an adaptation that enables a species to blend in with its environment |
mimicry | the resemblance of one species to another |
selective breeding | the breeding of organisms for desired characteristics |
comparative anatomy | the study of similarities and differences among structures of living species |
homologous structures | body parts of organisms that are similar in structure and position but different in function |
analogous structures | body parts that perform a similar function but differ in structure |
vestigial structure | body parts that have lost their original function through evolution |
embryology | the science of the development of embryos from fertilization to birth |