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Flashcards in Exam 3 Deck (69)
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1
Q

In what famous piece of work did Buffon suggest that life in the NewWorld was small, weak, and feeble?

A

Histiore Naturelle

2
Q

Who opposed Buffon’s work?

A

Thomas Jefferson

3
Q

What is the most recent mass extinction?

A

Pleistocene megafauna extinction

4
Q

The remains or traces of past-living organisms (usually more than 10,000 years old)

A

Fossils

5
Q

What is the term for when water seeps into fossils breaking them down but the shape of the fossil is preserved

A

Dissolution

6
Q

What is the term for when organisms fossilize as layers of thin carbon spread on sandstone and shale

A

Carbonization

7
Q

What kind of rock does fossilization most often occur in?

A

Sedimentary rock

8
Q

What is the term for when huge numbers of fossils are found together?

A

Lagerstatten

9
Q

Fossils found lower down in the sediment at a particular locality are older than those closer to the surface

A

Law of Superposition (relative)

10
Q

Is chemical dating by testing fluorine concentration relative or absolute?

A

Relative

11
Q

Is radiocarbon and radiopotassiunm dating relative or absolute?

A

Absolute

12
Q

What does Carbon 14 decay into?

A

Nitrogen 14

13
Q

What is Carbon 14’s half-life?

A

5730 years

14
Q

What is Potassium 40’s half-life?

A

1.3 billion years

15
Q

Lag time between last known species and extinction

A

Backward smearing

16
Q

Burrowing animals more fossilized remained up through the layers

A

Forward smearing

17
Q

A sudden spike in extinction.

Typically a 50%-75% loss of species in many major taxa over a broad geographical range

A

Mass extinction

18
Q

All other extinction not considered mass extinction, making up about 95% of extinction events

A

Background extinction

19
Q

Species native to only one area

A

Endemic

20
Q

Rapid burst of speciation

A

Evolutionary radiation

21
Q

What did new morphologies in herbaceous plants allow for?

A

More efficient light gathering, and better water absorption/transportation

22
Q

What are the 5 major mass extinctions?

A
End of Ordovician 
Late Devonian 
Late Permian 
End of Triassic 
Cretaceous-Paleocene Boundary
23
Q

Occurred ~65 MYA
Half of genera died (including dinosaurs)
Data eventually looked indicative of a catastrophic event

A

The Cretaceous-Paleogene Mass Extinction

24
Q

Russell and Tucker proposed that what catastrophic event ended the cretaceous period?

A

A large supernova explosion near Earth

25
Q

Walter Alvarez and his father supported the theory that what catastrophic event ended the cretaceous period?

A

An asteroid collision with Earth

26
Q

Which element is rare and indicative of an asteroid collision?

A

Iridium

27
Q

Amino acids of et origin, glassy materials called spinels, “impact diamonds,” and rapid extinction in pollen-producing plants and marine taxa are all proof of…

A

Asteroid contact with Earth

28
Q

Largest mass extinction, Occurred ~250 MYA, 90% of species went extinct, the slate of life was almost wiped clean

A

Permian Mass Extinction

29
Q

A large volcanic eruption in Siberia ~251 MYA causing an initial cooling period followed by warming, increased ocean acidification and low levels of oxygen are thought to be the cause of which mass extinction?

A

Permian Mass Extinction

30
Q

Does species longevity have an effect on probability of extinction?

A

No

31
Q

Does geographical range have an effect on probability of extinction?

A

Log-odds ratio of zero means no association, positive value indicates that species with broad ranges show reduced extinction rates

32
Q

A model in which new species arise from a gradual transformation of an ancestral species through slow and constant change

A

Phyletic gradualism model

33
Q

One way that new species in the fossil record may arise: branching speciation events

A

Cladogenesis

34
Q

One way that new species in the fossil record may arise: gradual modification of form without branching speciation

A

Anagenesis

35
Q

Lineage has not died out but changed so much that it is now classified as a new species

A

Pseudoextinction

36
Q

A model in which a minor degree of change is always occurring but stasis, is the rule during the vast majority of lineage’s history

A

Punctuated Equilibrium Model

37
Q

Caused there to be a new array of multicellular organisms with new body forms and shapes; most of the animal groups that have ever lived appeared for the first time in this era

A

The Cambrian Explosion

38
Q

Trend in which the direction of diversification is limited due to some constraint on evolution

A

Passive trend

39
Q

Trend in which the tendency for entire distribution to increase/decrease

A

Active trend

40
Q

Two types of active trend

A

Parallel or Species Selection

41
Q

When environmental unpredictability is high, is sexual or asexual reproduction high?

A

sexual reproduction

42
Q

When the number of niches is low, is asexual or sexual reproduction high?

A

asexual reproduction

43
Q

When parasite load is high, is asexual or sexual reproduction high?

A

sexual reproduction

44
Q

The production of offspring from unfertilized gamete (multicellular eukaryotes)

A

Asexual reproduction

45
Q

Unfertilized eggs are produced by mitosis-like cell division (daughter cels with an unreduced number of chromosomes); daughter cells are genetically identical to mother

A

Apomixis

46
Q

Production of haploid gametes from meiosis which subsequently fuse to restore diploidy; daughter cells are genetically distinct from mother and siblings

A

Automixis

47
Q

The joining together of genetic material from two parents

A

Sexual reproduction

48
Q

Alternating phases of meiosis and gamete fusion

A

Amphimixis

49
Q

What are the three steps of amphimixis?

A

Recombination, gamete production, gamete fusion

50
Q

Do sexual or asexual females pass on twice as many copies of their genes?

A

Asexual

51
Q

Who showed that the number of asexual individuals would grow at twice the rate of sexual individuals?

A

John Maynard Smith

52
Q

Sexual reproduction by the fusion of dissimilar gametes

A

Anisogamy

53
Q

Sexual reproduction by the fusion of similar gametes

A

Isogamy

54
Q

Two-fold cost of sex is only seen in what type of sexual reproduction?

A

Anisogamy

55
Q

An allele at one locus os favored when it occurs in the presence of a specific allele at another locus

A

Favorable gene combination

56
Q

Does sex break up or favor favorable gene combinations?

A

Break up

57
Q

Despite all of the costs, sex still does these two things that seem to be most important…

A

Purges deleterious alleles, and generates genetic variation, some of which can be favored by natural selection

58
Q

The irreversible buildup of deleterious mutation in asexual species is referred to as…

A

Muller’s ratchet

59
Q

Recombination allows natural selection to operate at a quicker rate

A

The Fisher-Muller Hypothesis

60
Q
  1. Oscillations in the relative frequency of asexual lineages when parasites are present
  2. Time lags: for a brief time the asexual host may evolve defense, until selection favors parasite
  3. A correlation between parasite load and sexual reproduction
A

The Red Queen Hypothesis

61
Q

Selection favors females who have a genetic predisposition to choose mates that provide them with resources-above and beyond sperm- that increase their fecundity and/or survival

A

Direct benefit of intersexual selection

62
Q

Ofte males display elaborate ornaments and females exhibit a preference for these ornaments. Why?

A

Good genes

63
Q

Some females express a preference for an ornament, and because of this preference, selection favors both the male ornament and further female preference for it. What does this describe ?

A

Fisherian Sexual Selection

64
Q

When statistical associations are preset between the alleles at 2 different loci

A

Linkage disequilibrium

65
Q

Females benefits from mating with colorful males because they are more likely to produce sons who are colorful and this preferred by females

A

Sexy son mechanism

66
Q

If genetic correlation between trait and preference is extremely high =, the system can “run away” in a positive feedback loop

A

Runaway sexual selection

67
Q

Females initially prefer a certain male trait, not because of any mating benefit, but rather female nervous systems respond to the trait either because it is associated with some benefit outside of mate choice or simply as an artifact of how the stimulus excited their nervous system

A

Sensory bias

68
Q

The probability that an all in one individual has a copy that is identically decent in another individual

A

Coefficient of relatedness

69
Q

A pair of strategies in which neither player can benefit by unilaterally changing his strategy

A

Nash equilibrium