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Natural Selection & EvolutionEdexcel GCSE Biology: Flashcards

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Who developed evolution by natural selection?

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Who developed evolution by natural selection?
Charles Darwin and Alfred Wallace, publishing jointly in 1858.
What did Darwin publish in 1859?
On the Origin of Species.
Explain Darwin's theory of natural selection.
Variation exists; best-adapted survive/reproduce; advantageous genes passed on; proportion increases over generations, can lead to speciation.
Define speciation.
Formation of a new species when populations can no longer interbreed.
How does antibiotic resistance support Darwin's theory?
Resistant bacteria survive antibiotic exposure and reproduce, passing on the gene, spreading resistance.
What is Ardi and its age?
A 4.4-million-year-old hominid fossil showing ape/human mix of features.
What does Lucy show?
3.2-million-year-old fossil showing bipedalism evolved before large brain size.
What did Richard Leakey discover?
1.6-million-year-old fossils showing further changes towards modern human skeleton.
Order the fossils oldest to youngest.
Ardi (4.4mya) → Lucy (3.2mya) → Leakey's fossils (1.6mya).
How can stone tools be dated?
Indirectly, via the rock stratum they are found in.
What is a pentadactyl limb?
A limb with a 5-digit bone structure found in many vertebrates.
How does the pentadactyl limb provide evolutionary evidence?
Shared structure despite different functions suggests a common ancestor.
What replaced the five-kingdom classification system?
The three-domain system (Archaea, Bacteria, Eukarya).
Why was the three-domain system proposed?
Genetic analysis showed prokaryotes were genetically two distinct groups.