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| Descent with modification; the idea that living species are descendants of ancestral species that were different from the present-day ones; also defined more narrowly as the change in the genetic composition of a population from generation to generation. |
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| A preserved remnant or impression of an organism that lived in the past. |
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| A rock layer formed when new layers of sediment cover older ones and compress them. |
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| The scientific study of fossils. |
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| The principle that events in the past occured suddenly and were caused by different mechanisms than those operating today. |
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| The principle that mechanisms of change are constant over time. |
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| Inherited characteristic of an organism that enhances its survival and reproduction in a specific enviornment. |
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| A process in which individuals that have certain inherited traits tend to survive and reproduce at higher rates than other individuals because of those traits. |
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| The selective breeding of domesticated plants and animals to encourage the occurance of desirable traits. |
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| Similarity in characteristics resulting from a shared ancestry. |
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| Structures in different species that are similar because of common ancestry. |
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| A feature of an organism that is a historical remnant of a structure that served a function in the organism's ancestors. |
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| A branching diagram that reflects a hypothesis about evolutionary relationships among groups of organisms. |
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| The evolution of similar figures in independent evolutionary lineages. |
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| Having characteristics that are similar because of convergent evolution, not homology. |
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| The study of the past and present geographic distribution of species. |
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| The supercontinent that formed near the end of the Paleozoic era, when plate movements brought all the landmasses of Earth together. |
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| Referring to a species that is confined to a specific geographic area. |
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