History of Life
Terms
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- Half-life
- Length of time required for half of the radioactive atoms in a sample to decay.
- Coevolution
- Process by which two species evolve in response to changes in each other over time.
- Punctuated Equilibrium
- Pattern of long stable periods interrupted by brief periods of rapid change.
- Convergent Evolution
- Process by which unrelated organisms come to resemble one another.
- Paleontologists
- Scientists who study fossils.
- Geological Time Scale
- Used to represent the evolutionary time.
- Periods
- Subdivisions of the larger scale "eras".
- Relative Dating
- Dating that determines the age of a fossil by its placement in layer of rock.
- Index Fossils
- Fossils that are used to compare relative ages of fossils.
- Radioactive Dating
- The use of half-lives to determine the age of a sample.
- Precambrian
- Name for the time in earths early history that accounts for ninety percent of earth's time, but only cellular organisms lived.
- Extinct
- When a species dies out they are??
- Microfossils
- Microscopic fossils.
- Macroevolution
- Large-scale evolutionary patterns and processes that occur over very long periods of time.
- Mesozoic
- Era known for dinosaurs.