Evolution Test - 5

Information on geological period in which an organism existed can be gathered from paleontological evidences i.e. from fossils. Fossils are the remains or impression of a prehistoric plant or animal embedded in layers of sediments and preserved in petrified form.

Predators spot a moth against contrasting background and white winged moth did not survive the predators due to trees becoming dark because of industrial smoke.

Formation of new species due to drastic change in allele frequency is called founder effect. Here, allele frequency is so different in the new sample of population that they become different species. The original members of the new species become founders of new species.

Saltation means single step large mutation. It is a great evolutionary progress just made in a single step, which causes large mutation.

Darwin's finches were originally seed eaters which evolved on the same island and differed in shape and size of beaks because many of them later became insectivores.

'Homo erectus' is the zoological name of Peking man. The remains were first discovered in 1923-27 during excavations at Zhoukoudian (Choukoutien) near Beijing (Peking), China.

Theory of spontaneous generation was supported by Van Helmont. He insisted that knowledge of the natural world could be obtained only by experimentation.

Limulus is a living fossil. A living fossil is a living species (or clade) of organism that appears to be similar to a species otherwise known only from fossils. Normally the similarity is only a superficial physical resemblance between two different species, one extinct and the other extant.

Weismann proposed germ-plasm theory. In the germ-plasm theory, inheritance in a multicellular organism only takes place by means of the germ cells: the gametes, such as egg cells and sperm cells. Other cells of the body do not function as agents of heredity.
Inheritance of acquired characters - Lamarck
Theory of Abiogenesis - Henri Bergson
Recapitulation Theory - Ernst Haeckel

Many traits such as height, shape, weight and skin colour are governed by the cumulative effects of many genes. Traits showing continuous variation are usually controlled by the additive effects of two or more separate gene pairs. This is an example of polygenic inheritance. Height in humans is a polygenic trait. Polygenic traits are recognisable by their expression as a gradation of small differences (a continuous variation).