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| Biological Species Concept |
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| Definition of a species as a population or group of populations whose members can breed with one another in nature and produce fertile offspring |
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| Major biological changes evident in the fossil record |
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| Condition in which a reproductive barrier keeps two species from interbreeding |
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| Separation of populations as a result of geographic change or migration to geographically isolated places |
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| Evolution from a common ancestor of many species adapted to diverse environments |
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| Evolutionary model suggesting species often diverge in spurts of relatively rapid change, followed by long periods of little change |
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| Study of multicellular organisms as they develope from fertilized eggs to fully formed organisms |
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| Earth's history organized into four eras: Precambian, Paleozoic, Mesozoic, and Cenozoic |
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| Determination of absolute ages of rocks and fossils through calculations based on radioactive isotope's fixed rate of decay |
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| Time it takes for 50 percent of a radioactive isotope sample to decay |
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| Motion of comtinents about Earth's surface on plates of crust floating on the hot mantle |
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| Episode of great species loss |
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| Identification, naming, and classification of species |
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| Two-part Latin name of a species |
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| Branching diagram, suggesting evolutionary relationships, that classifies species into groups within groups |
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| Process in which unrelated species from similar environments have adaptaions that are very similar |
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| Similarities among unrelated species that result from convergent evolution |
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| Homologous characteristic that unites organisms as a group |
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| Phylogenetic tree constructed from a seris of two-way branch points, suggesting ancestral relationships among species |
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