Study Guide
What is the difference between science and advocacy?
What is the scientific method?
Why do we need controls and replicates in scientific experiments and what are they?
Why is genetic diversity in a population so important?
Why are northern elephant seals in danger in spite of the fact that they have large numbers of
individuals?
Know the significance of : Charles Darwin, The Voyage of the Beagle, Galapagos, Thomas Malthus,
Hutton and Lyell, The finches of the Galapagos, Alfred Wallace, Lamarck, Linneaus
What is the Theory of Evolution via Natural Selection? (Observations and Inferences)
Know the types of evidence for evolution and what they are.
What is microevolution? What is the smallest unit of evolutionary change?
Why does Dr. Decker talk about evolution in terms of probabilities instead of certainty? Why aren’t
organisms perfectly adapted to their environment?
What is a population?
Define: gene pool, genetic drift, microevolution, macroevolution, gene flow, bottleneck effect, founder
effect, mutation, non-random mating
What are the causes of microevolution? (non-random mating, mutation, natural selection, etc., from
lecture)
Be able to distinguish among graphs and give examples showing stabilizing, directional, and disruptive
selection.
What are pre and post zygotic mechanisms of speciation? Be able to give examples.
Know the difference among vicariance, dispersal, allopatry and sympatry, be able to give examples of
each.
CH 7
Know the 4 zoic eras, What major events/organisms define each era?
Know the Permian and Cretaceous mass extinctions
What is adaptive radiation? What are the 4 causes of adaptive radiation? What is similar among the 4
causes?
Define continental drift, Pangaea, Laurasia, Gondwana. How have the movements of continents affected
the diversity of life?
How did photosynthetic bacteria change the atmosphere in the Archaean?
What are the challenges and solutions to life on land?
What are coal swamps?
What defines the boundary between the Paleozoic and the Mesozoic? Between the Mesozoic and the
Cenozoic?
Name an example of an evolutionary novelty that led to an adaptive radiation.
What is a rain shadow? How does mountain-building affect species and climate?
Understand and be able to describe the difference between Adaptive Radiation and Adaptation