Evolution Vocabulary

5. Changes in genetic material over time
7. Study of Earth’s history and how it changes over time
9. “Survival of the fittest”; organisms better able to adapt to their environment survive and reproduce successfully
10. Traits from an ancestor that no longer serve a useful function in current species
13. History of life as documented by fossils
15. No changes in allele frequencies within a species
18. Process by which two species living close together evolve in response to each other
19. How well an organism can survive and reproduce in its environment
20. Different structures that serve the same function; found in organisms that do not share a common ancestor

1. selective breeding of plants and animals to produce desirable traits
2. The organism from which two or more lineages have descended
3. Sudden, rapid changes after a stable period
4. Slow changes over a long period of time
6. Similar physical features that serve different functions; found in organisms that share a common ancestor
8. The preserved remains of plants and animals whose bodies were buried in sediments
11. Heritable traits that increase an organism’s ability to survive and reproduce
12. Organisms with the same evolutionary history adapt to different environments
14. Diagram used to show patterns of traits among species
16. The study of how an embryo develops
17. Organisms with different evolutionary histories adapt to similar environments