Evolution, the Themes of Biology, and Scientific Inquiry

A set of 100 comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering key terms, concepts, biological structures, and scientific processes from Chapter 1.

Evolution

The process of change over time that has resulted in the astounding array of organisms found on Earth; the fundamental principle of biology.

Biology

The scientific study of life.

Peromyscus polionotus

The species of mouse that exhibits light, dappled fur in coastal sand dunes and darker fur in nearby inland areas as a camouflage adaptation.

Adaptation

An inherited characteristic or trait that enhances an organism's survival and reproductive success in a specific environment.

Order

A characteristic property of life illustrated by highly structured and organized architecture, such as the petal and seed arrangement of a sunflower.

Regulation

A property of life in which mechanisms maintain internal balance, such as blood flow through jackrabbit ears adjusting heat exchange to maintain body temperature.

Energy processing

A property of life wherein organisms take in fuel (such as nectar) and use stored chemical energy to power flight and other cellular work.

Growth and development

A property of life governed by inherited information carried by genes that controls the pattern of an organism's maturation.

Response to the environment

A property of life demonstrated when an organism reacts to an environmental stimulus, such as a Venus flytrap rapidly closing when an insect touches it.

Biosphere

The global ecological system consisting of all life on Earth and all places where life exists, including land, bodies of water, sediments, and the atmosphere.

Ecosystem

All the living organisms in a particular area along with all the nonliving components of the environment with which life interacts, such as soil, water, atmospheric gases, and light.

Biological community

The array of organisms inhabiting a particular ecosystem, consisting of all the different species and populations living together.

Species

A group of organisms whose members can only reproduce with other members of the group.

Population

All the individuals of a single species living within the bounds of a specified geographical area.

Organism

An individual living entity, such as a single plant, animal, fungus, or bacterium.

Reductionism

An approach that reduces complex biological systems to simpler components that are more manageable to study.

Organ

A body part that is made up of multiple tissues and carries out specific functions in the body.

Tissue

A group of cells that work together, performing a specialized function within an organ.

Photosynthesis

The biological process that converts light energy from the sun to the chemical energy of sugar and food molecules.

Epidermis

The jigsaw puzzle-like skin tissue on the surface of a plant leaf containing pores that allow carbon dioxide ($\text{CO}_2$) to enter.

Cell

Life's fundamental unit of structure and function; the smallest unit of organization that can perform all activities required for life.

Chloroplast

A photosynthetic organelle present in eukaryotic plant cells that contains chlorophyll and converts light energy into chemical energy.

Organelle

Any of several functional components and compartments present within cells.

Molecule

A chemical structure consisting of two or more units called atoms held together by chemical bonds.

Chlorophyll

The green pigment in chloroplasts that absorbs sunlight during photosynthesis.

Emergent properties

Novel properties that emerge at successive levels of the biological hierarchy that are absent from the preceding lower level, caused by the arrangement and interactions of parts.

Systems biology

An approach to studying biology that aims to explore a biological system by analyzing the interactions among its parts.

Cell Theory

A foundational biological theory developed in the 1800s stating that all living organisms are made of cells, which are the basic unit of life.

Prokaryotic cell

A type of cell lacking a nucleus or other membrane-enclosed organelles; characteristic of bacteria and archaea.

Eukaryotic cell

A type of cell containing membrane-enclosed organelles, including a DNA-containing nucleus; found in protists, plants, fungi, and animals.

Chromosome

A cellular structure carrying genetic material in the form of one very long DNA molecule bearing hundreds or thousands of genes.

DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid)

The double-stranded genetic material containing information necessary to build all molecules synthesized within a cell.

Gene

A discrete unit of inheritance consisting of a section of DNA on a chromosome that encodes biological instructions.

Nucleotide

One of four chemical building blocks of DNA, abbreviated A, T, C, and G.

Double helix

The three-dimensional form of a DNA molecule, made up of two long chains (strands) of nucleotides wound around each other.

Gene expression

The entire process by which the information in a gene directs the manufacture of a cellular product, such as a protein.

Messenger RNA (mRNA)

A type of RNA transcribed from a gene's nucleotide sequence that is translated into a chain of amino acids.

Transcription

The process by which a cell makes a specific RNA molecule using the sequence of DNA nucleotides as a template.

Translation

The cellular process of interpreting the sequence of mRNA nucleotides to synthesize a chain of amino acids.

Amino acid

A chemical building block linked in series to form a protein with a unique shape and function.

Crystallin

A transparent protein packed tightly within eye lens cells that allows the lens to focus light.

Genetic code

The universal language of nucleotide sequences shared across all forms of life, evidence that all life is related.

Genome

The entire library of genetic instructions that an organism inherits.

Genomics

An approach in which researchers study whole sets of genes (or other DNA) in one or more species simultaneously.

Proteomics

The study of sets of proteins and their properties.

Proteome

The entire set of proteins expressed by a given cell, tissue, or organism.

High-throughput technology

Tools and automated laboratory methods capable of analyzing many biological samples very rapidly.

Bioinformatics

The use of computational tools to store, organize, and analyze the huge volume of data resulting from high-throughput methods.

Interdisciplinary research teams

Groups of diverse specialists—including computer scientists, mathematicians, engineers, chemists, physicists, and biologists—collaborating to solve complex biological questions.

Producer

An organism, such as a plant or other photosynthetic entity, that converts sunlight into chemical energy stored in food molecules.

Consumer

An organism, such as an animal, that feeds on other organisms or their remains to obtain chemical energy.

Decomposer

An organism, such as a fungus or bacterium, that breaks down waste products, leaf litter, and dead bodies, returning chemicals to the soil.

Feedback regulation

A biological mechanism in which the output or product of a process regulates that very process.

Negative feedback

A regulatory loop in which the physiological response reduces or dampens the initial stimulus, as seen in insulin signaling.

Positive feedback

A biological process in which an end product speeds up its own production, such as platelets aggregating to form a blood clot.

Insulin

A hormone secreted by the pancreas in response to high blood glucose that directs body cells to take up glucose and liver cells to store it.

Global warming

The rise in Earth's average surface temperature caused by heat trapped by greenhouse gases such as $\text{CO}_2$ released from burning fossil fuels.

Climate change

A directional change to the global climate that lasts for three decades or more, including shifts in temperature, wind, and precipitation patterns.

Extinction

The permanent loss and total disappearance of a species from Earth.

Genus

The taxonomic grouping above species and the first part of an organism's two-part scientific binomial name.

Domain Bacteria

One of the three domains of life, comprising the most diverse and widespread prokaryotes, currently classified into multiple kingdoms.

Domain Archaea

One of the three domains of life, consisting of prokaryotes that often live in Earth's extreme environments, such as salty lakes and boiling hot springs.

Domain Eukarya

The taxonomic domain comprising all organisms whose cells contain membrane-enclosed organelles and a nucleus, subdivided into kingdoms Plantae, Fungi, Animalia, and protists.

Kingdom Plantae

A kingdom of multicellular terrestrial eukaryotes that produce their own sugars and food molecules through photosynthesis.

Kingdom Fungi

A eukaryotic kingdom whose members obtain nutrition by absorbing dissolved nutrients from outside their bodies.

Kingdom Animalia

A eukaryotic kingdom consisting of multicellular organisms that ingest and digest other organisms for food.

Protists

The most numerous and diverse group of eukaryotes, consisting mostly of unicellular organisms and relatively simple multicellular relatives.

Cilia

Hair-like extensions of eukaryotic cells that function in locomotion or moving mucus, exhibiting a shared system of tubules across diverse organisms.

Rapetosaurus krausei

A species of long-necked dinosaur whose fossilized hind leg was excavated from rocks in Madagascar.

On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection

Charles Darwin's revolutionary book, published in November 1859, that articulated descent with modification and natural selection.

Descent with modification

Charles Darwin's phrase for evolution, capturing the concept that contemporary species arose from a succession of ancestral species while accumulating differences.

Natural selection

A primary cause of descent with modification, in which the natural environment selects for the propagation of advantageous heritable traits in a population.

Adaptive radiation

The evolutionary diversification of an ancestral species into multiple descendant species as isolated populations adapt to different environmental niches.

Galápagos finches

A famous collection of finch species collected by Darwin that diversified from a common South American ancestor, developing distinct beaks adapted to different island foods.

Branch point

A node in an evolutionary tree diagram where lineages diverge from a shared common ancestor.

Science

A systematic approach to understanding the natural world, derived from a Latin verb meaning 'to know.'

Scientific inquiry

A search for information and explanations of natural phenomena involving observations, hypotheses, and tests.

Scientific literature

The published contributions of scientists that form the existing foundation of factual knowledge upon which new research builds.

Data

Recorded observations or items of information on which scientific inquiry is based.

Qualitative data

Items of scientific information recorded as descriptions or sketches rather than numerical measurements.

Quantitative data

Items of scientific information generally expressed as numerical measurements and organized into tables or graphs.

Statistics

A branch of mathematics used by scientists to test whether experimental results are statistically significant or merely due to random fluctuations.

Inductive reasoning

A type of logic in which generalizations are derived from a large collection of specific observations.

Hypothesis

An explanation, based on observations and assumptions, that leads to a testable prediction; an explanation on trial.

Experiment

A scientific test carried out under controlled conditions to evaluate a prediction.

Deductive reasoning

A type of logic that flows from the general to the specific, using premises to extrapolate expected test results in the form of 'If… then' statements.

Scientific consensus

The shared conclusion of many scientists that a particular hypothesis explains known data well and withstands experimental testing.

Sceloporus

A genus of lizards in Mexico whose populations are declining due to warming temperatures forcing them into refuges and reducing foraging time.

Theodosius Dobzhansky

An evolutionary biologist who famously stated that 'Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.'

James Watson and Francis Crick

Biologists who used reductionism to infer the chemical basis of biological inheritance by studying the molecular structure of DNA.

Jane Goodall

A primatologist who gathered decades of qualitative and quantitative observational data on wild chimpanzee behavior in a Tanzanian jungle.

Charles Darwin

The naturalist who established natural selection as the driving mechanism of descent with modification in his 1859 book.

Platelets

Structures in blood that aggregate at the site of a damaged vessel and release chemicals attracting more platelets via positive feedback.

Testable hypothesis

A requirement of scientific inquiry stating that an explanation must allow observations or experiments that could reveal whether it is true or false.

Paramecium

A single-celled eukaryotic organism found in pond water that uses cilia for cellular locomotion.

Certhidea olivacea

The scientific binomial name for the green warbler finch of the Galápagos Islands, which possesses a slender beak adapted for grasping insects.

Platyspiza crassirostris

The scientific binomial name for the Galápagos vegetarian finch, an organism possessing a beak adapted for eating fruit.

Camarhynchus pallidus

The scientific binomial name for the Galápagos woodpecker finch, an insect-eating bird species.

Geospiza scandens

The scientific binomial name for the common cactus finch of the Galápagos Islands, adapted to consume cactus.

Geospiza magnirostris

The scientific binomial name for the large ground finch of the Galápagos Islands, featuring a thick, heavy beak adapted for cracking seeds.