2. After successfully participating
in this lab, you will be able to:
Explain how predation affects reproduction.
Explain how reproduction affects evolutionary fitness.
Describe factors that affect individual survival.
Demonstrate the difference between individual and
species survival.
Estimate the evolutionary fitness of a species by
interpreting population data.
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3. What is Evolution?
Evolution simply means change over time.
Evidence that life has evolved: Fossils, DNA,
similarities in morphology of different species
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4. This does not mean that
humans evolved from monkeys
Imagine how many generations would occur in a million years
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10. For Natural Selection to occur:
1.) There must be variation in traits between
individuals within a population
2.) The traits must be heritable.
3.) Certain variants of the trait must be more
advantageous than others
4.) Those with the most advantageous variants are
more likely to survive and reproduce
(evolutionary fitness)
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11. For Natural Selection to occur:
You cannot "will yourself" to get an adaptation. The
adaptations must naturally occur in populations.
For example, if a species of butterfly is orange, and a
mutation occurs that makes a butterfly red, if red
helps the organism survive, then it will be passed on to
offspring.
Happens over millions of years, thousands of
generations. The Earth is 4.6 billion years old –that's a
long time for organisms to change.
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12. Charles Darwin
• Theory of Natural
Selection
•"those individuals who
possess superior physical,
behavioral, or other attributes
are more likely to survive than
those which are not so well
endowed.“
•In plain English – “Survival
of the Fittest” means the
most well adapted organisms
will survive to reproduce.
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13. Darwin and the Galapagos Islands
Darwin compiled evidence for natural selection from decades of
observations around the world. This is why it is referred to as the
Theory of Natural Selection – not just a guess.
Most famous for studying tortoises and finches on the Galapagos
Islands
600 miles from South America—ancestral species migrated to
islands and adapted to many different island environments
over millions of years
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17. COEVOLUTION
Yucca Moth and Yucca plant coevolved
for pollination, a mutually beneficial
relationship
Cheetah and Gazelle
Coevolved for SPEED.
One to outrun the other.
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18. The Peppered Moth
Prior to the industrial revolution, selection favored light-colored
individuals; the dark phenotype was rare
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19. •Industrial Revolution (late 1800’s) = more soot and
pollution
•Sulfur dioxide emissions kill light-colored lichens.
•No lichens = dark-colored environment favorable for
dark-colored moths to blend into and avoid predation!
•More dark-colored variants survive; today there are many
more dark individuals!
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21. THE EVOLUTION GAME
Objectives
After successfully participating in this lab, you
will be able to:
• explain how predation affects reproduction.
• explain how reproduction affects
evolutionary fitness.
• describe factors that affect individual
survival.
• demonstrate the difference between
individual and species
survival.
• estimate the evolutionary fitness of a species
by interpreting
population data.
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22. Why do we play a game in lab?
Simulation
Taking a class of 640 Natural Science
students out into the field to observe
predator/prey interactions would be very
expensive (to go to the Galapagos would be
$10,000 each)
Predators/Prey never act like they do in
nature when confined to lab
This game is fun and actually informative
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Mention that darwin concluded that these finches had a recent common ancestor
The case of the Peppered Moth in Manchester, England is a well-documented study demonstrating the value of camouflage in Natural Selection and the continuing process of evolution. This case involves two variations of the same organism, a white-colored phenotype and a black-colored phenotype.
Scientists have determined that a single gene controls the body color of the peppered moth. The dark phenotype is controlled by a dominant allele, which means that a moth possessing at least one such allele will have a dark body. (Each individual will have alleles - one from each of its parents.) To have a light body, the moth must have both alleles for light body color.
This change in the environment caused the white moths to become more visible and more likely to be eaten by birds, while the black form became better camouflaged. This situation led to a decrease in the population of white moths while the black moths were better able to breed and therefore increase in number.
In 1848, the dark moths comprised 1% of the population and by 1959 they represented ~90% of the population. So, in 100 years the frequency of dark moths increased by 1000 fold!
Prior to the industrial revolution, the white moths comprised 99% of the moth population. The white moths were protected by their ability to blend with the light-colored lichens, which lived on the bark of trees.
The black moths were visible against the light background and therefore more susceptible to being eaten by birds. In fact, the dark moths only comprised 1% of the population. Consequently, the black variety did not have as great a chance to reproduce and increase their numbers. The white variation was more fit. Thus the frequency of the dark allele was very low (about .001%), maintained primarily by spontaneous mutation from light to dark alleles.