Pages

308-311
— In the 19th Century, many individuals, including
scientists believed that the Earth was less than 10, 000
years old

— They applied this belief to landforms with mountains

and coastlines to even living organisms

— People believed that species never changed

— Discoveries in paleontology and geology started to

disprove their beliefs
— Today there is a large consensus that the Earth is
EXTREMELY old

— Geology, physics and astronomy support the idea that

the Earth our solar system is more than 4.5 billion
years old

— Recent advances in technology has assisted us to come

to these understandings
— Radioisotopes are used to determine estimates of ages
of rocks

— Radioisotopes are atoms that undergo radioactive

decay

— This method is based on the ratio of parent to

daughter isotopes in rock formations

— Half-life = time it takes for exactly 50% of the parent

isotope to decay into a daughter isotope
— Darwin’s theory supported how species evolved, but could
not account for the actual source of variation

— The knowledge and understanding from genetics and

biology combined with Darwin’s theory form the
MODERN EVOLUTIONARY SYNTHESIS

— Darwin defined evolution as “changes in the inherited

traits of a species over time

— Today evolution is defined as “changes in the gene pool of a

species over time”
— Gene pool = all the alleles of all individuals that are
currently present in a particular species or population

— Individuals vary in their traits because they inherit

different combinations of alleles

— Natural selection favours some genetic combinations

over others
— All species exhibit genetic variation

— Sexual reproduction shuffles or recombines these

alleles and produces an almost unlimited number of
combinations

— A genetic mutation is a change in the DNA

— The bases that make up DNA are switched or lost and

new bases are inserted
— Mutations can also result in having 2 copies of genes

— Duplication events are usually a result of CROSSING OVER

during meiosis

— Gametes that receive a chromosome that is missing a

section has a low chance of survival

— Extra copies of genes can be beneficial (example on

amylase in textbook on page 309)

— Gene duplication is an important type of mutation because

it is a source of new genes

— The extra copy of the gene is free to mutate and may gain a
new function
— Beneficial mutations give the individual an advantage
and are selected for by the environment

— Harmful mutations may make an organism less able to

resist disease or avoid predators, or less efficient in
obtaining food

— Individuals with harmful mutations are less successful

at reproducing – thus tend to eventually disappear
— Organisms have genomes consisting of millions and
often billions of DNA bases

— Populations often consist of millions of individuals

— Large genomes are estimated to have mutation rates

averaging more than 1/individual

— With 7 billion people in this world, we have well over

100 billion genetic mutations
— Similar to homologous features, closely related species
inherit homologous genes

— These genes are inherited from a common ancestor

and mutate and evolve over time

— The more closely related two species are, the more

similar we would expect their homologous genes to be
— Pseudogenes – genes that have undergone mutations
and no longer serve a useful purpose

— Pseudogenes are the remaining part of the gene that

once served a useful purpose

— These genes are found in virtually all species

— Paleontologists have unearthed spectacular fossils

— Distribution of fossils supported Darwin in his theory and

collection of observations

— Locations for some of the fossils were quite puzzling

— Plate tectonics and continental drift can be used to explain

the location of fossils around the world

— Fossils also show a distinct pattern in time (older fossils are

more simple and lower, more recent fossils are higher in
the lithosphere)
— Page 313 #1,3,8