gen bio quiz 2 - life on earth

precambrian

longest era (3 billion yrs)

prokaryotes

cyanobacteria

blue-green algae autotroph bacteria

hadean

chaotic, volcanic eruptions

archean

most of earth was ocean, prokaryotes became a thing

stromatolites

earliest identifiable fossils

proterozoic

eukaryotes became a thing

acritarchs

cysts of single celled organisms

charles lapworth from “ordovices”

named the ordovician period

cambrian

variety life form appeared, explosion

age of invertebrates

adam sedgwick (1835)

named the cambrian period

ordovician

rich marine ecosystem, simple plants

silurian

dawn of fishes, rising sea levels

devonian

beginning of terrestrial life

carboniferous

age of amphibians with high oxygen levels, humid (300 mya)

first appearance of mammals

permian

extinction of land (70%) and sea (90%) animals

mesozoic

age of dinosaurs

triassic

turtles evolved into dinos

jurrasic

golden age of dinos w humid climate

cretaceous

earth was warmer, flying reptiles

end of mesozoic era

“middle life”, meteorite impact hypothesis

tertiary

mass extiction of non-avian dinos

appearance of hominids

quatenary

age of mammals, ice age

relative dating

order of past events without knowing its absolute/exact age

absolute dating

calculating the actual age of rocks using radiometric dating, discovered in 1900s