evolution

a heritable trait that enhances the ability of an organism to reproduce in a particular environment

alternative versions of genes that differ in nucleotide sequence - different alleles may produce differences in character expression

the ability of an individual to contribute offspring to the next generation

the differing biological fitness of individuals with some traits compared to individuals with other traits

change across generations in the distribution of heritable phenotypes and genotypes in a population

the chains in a gene pool from a situation where there exists more than one variant of a particular gene (allele) to a situation where only one allele remains

the movement of alleles among populations due to migration and subsequent interbreeding

random changes in allele or genotype frequencies within a population

a measure of how much of the variation in a given trait among individuals in a population can be attributed to genetic variation among those individuals. - higher heritability means that offspring will more strongly resemble their parents - low heritability means that individual variation in a trait is due largely to variation among individuals in their environment

evolution across geologic timescales (generally mya) involving groups of species

evolution within a population or among populations within a species, over shorter timescales than those examined in macroevolution

individuals that have traits that increase their biological fitness within their environment reproduce more than those with less beneficial traits - traits differences are heritable = the more fit parents will pass their trait to their offspring and the pop. will evolve as the freq. of the more fit trait increases in the next gen - vice versa if the traits aren’t heritable = trait won’t evolve = freq wont increase in next gen

an assertion that there is no relationship among observations that the relationship is due to chance, or than an experimental treatment has no observable effect other than that expected by chance

a group of interbreeding individuals that belong to the same species and occupy a similar geographic area

an approach to understanding microevolution that combines mathematical theory and experimental data to understand the effects of mutation, genetic drift, gene flow, and natural selection on genes within and among populations

an observable feature, such as eye color or a behavior or a specific locus in a sequence of dna

an array that constrains the character states (along the top) of a group of taxa (along the left)

a specific form of a character - ex: eye color is a character, where as brown eyes and blue eyes are character states - character = gen, character state = more specific within that topic

a monophyletic group made up of on an ancestor (node) and all of its descendants (also called a phylogenetic group)

tree-like representation of proposed relationships among taxonomic groups; branch lengths DO NOT represent time

when organisms share similar characteristics states but do not share them with their most recent common ancestor - ex: the character states evolved independently of one another, such as the ability to fly in bats, birds, and insects

a new character or character state to present in the ancestor

any preserved remnant of impression of an organism that lived in the past

all of the fossils that exist from the history of life, whether discovered or undiscovered by people