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Definitions |
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Permian dates
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299-251
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Silurian dates
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444-416 Ma
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Parent
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An unstable radioactive isotope
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Paleontology
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the study of fossils
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correlation
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demonstrating correspondance between geographically seperated parts of a stratigraphic unit
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Hadrosaur
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a duck-billed herbivorous dinosaur. developed dental batteries, teeth tightly packed
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burrows
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trace fossils include
a) burrows
b) casts of body parts
c) molds of body parts
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Acitarchs
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organic welled microfossils, uncertain affinity, probs resting stage of phytoplankton
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Pteritophytes
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Late Silurian to recent
Ferns: spore-bearing plants
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Nutrients
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building block for organic matter.
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Multituberculate
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extremely diverse and numerous but were outcompeted by placental rodents. existed for 100 million years, longest of any mammal order. Successful in Cretaceous, dropped in Paleocene.
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fold
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a bend in layers of rock
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...
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Meandering stream deposits
a. Contain point bar deposits
b. Are mostly fine-grained on floodplains
c. Are cross-bedded sand bodies with shoe string geometries
d. A and b only
e. All of the above
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seismic wave that moves the fastest
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primary
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Evolution
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a heritable change in the characteristics within a population from one generation to the next
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Four species of Hominoid?
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Gibbon/ Orangatang/ Gorilla/Chimp/Bonobo
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Protists
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Everything else (not invertebrate or vertebrates)
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FUNGI
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Fungi are eukaryotic organisms that develop from chitinous
fungal spores (propagules), have chitinous cell walls,
and lack undulipodia at all stages of the life cycle.
Most fungi are multicellular. They all acquire
nutrients by digesting living or dead tissue through a
process known as absorptive heterotrophy. Fungal cells
can have more than one nucleus per cell.
Reproduction occurs asexually, through mitosis, or
sexually, in which meiosis produces haploid propagules.
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Paleocene
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India was isolate in Indian Ocean, Australia and South America were still connected to Antartica. Paleocene climate was warmer than today. Palm trees grew in Greenland and the tropical Australian swamps were latitude 65' south
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fossil
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preserved remains or evidence of an ancient organism
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Conduction
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The transfer of heat through direct contact of materials of different temperature (touch a duck)
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angular unconformity
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Younger strata overlying an erosional surface of tilited or folded strata is
a) a nonconformity
b) a disconformity
c) an angular unconformity
d) none of the above
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early proponent of plutonism and uniformitarianism
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james hutton
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3 eras of phanerozoic
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cenozoic, Mesazoic, and Paleozoic
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ecological convergence
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similar features or characteristics in unrelated organisms
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Geologic Column
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the ordered arrangement of rock layers; it represents a timeline of Earth's history. The oldest rocks are at the bottom.
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Topset, Foreset, Bottomset
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Delta Plain, Delta Front, Prodelta
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Name 5 terranes
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India, Italy, Tibet, Wrangellia, Cresent
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cosmogenic dating
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particle strike certain atoms in crystalline materials at earths surfacs causing them to fragment and form lighter nuclei
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Ungulates
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Mammals that walk on their toe-nails (hooves)--Odd toed ungulates=horses, rhinos--Eventoed ungulates= cattle, pigs, sheep and camels-The early rhino was the larges land animal. It was 18' at the shoulder. -Later the even toed ungulates expanded at the multi-stomach digestive system evolved.
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Ice Age Temperatures
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Reconstructed from data from ice cores, recording the atmospheric history through Ice Ages.
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What is a index fossil during the Mississippan period
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Pentremites
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basic mechanism of Darwin's theory of evolution
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natural selection
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the extinction of the dinosaurs at the end of the mesazoic has been attributed to the impact of this
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asteroid
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Cope's Rule
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species tend to evolve to become larger through time
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Era
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a unit of geologic time that includes two or more periods
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Steno's Sequence of Events (5)
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Superpostion, Original Horizontality, O.g. Lateral Continuity, Cross Cutting Relationships, Inclusion
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paleoproterozoic
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build up of oxygen important- may have promoted success of eukaryotic algae
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Confuciusornis
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Named after Confucius. -Bird with no teeth; just a beak and a very short tail-Also it is one of the first examples of "sexual dimorphism" meaning, having a distinct physical difference between male and female of the species.
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Hell Creek Formation
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Eastern Montana and western South and North Dakota, is the only terrestrial sequence with abundant fossils form the K-T boundary time period. Triceratops, duck bull anatosaurus, T-Rex. Dinosaurs disappear at K-T Boundary, abundant small animals found above. Deposited over several million years.
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carbon 12
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stable isotope used to measure the age of organic material
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organic material
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14Carbon dating can only be used on
a) zircon crystals
b) feldspars
c) clays
d) organic material
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Uniformitarianism Theory
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- theory that the Earth is constantly changing
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Half-Life
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the time required for half of a sample of radioactive isotope to break down by radioactive decay to form a daughter isotope
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What are cratons?
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old central stable part of the continent.
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methane hydrate
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methane frozen within a range of water molecules
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Plate tectonics theory
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It states that the Earth’s outer shell (the lithosphere), which consists of the crust and upper mantle, is cracked and composed of pieces that float on a hot, deformable asthenosphere.
The pieces move in various directions, and may slowly spread apart, collide, or slip past one another.
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Pleistocene Laggerstatte
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La Brea Tar Pits in LA. Asphalt seeps to surface. "Predator trap," many specimens, excellent preservation. 650 species of plants and animals have been recovered.
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1 half-life
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The span of time for 50% for parent isotope to convert to daughter products
a) 1 half-life
b) 2 half-lives
c) 3 half-lives
d) 5,730 years
e) 4.6 billion years
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Historical Geology
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study of changes to earth and life in time and space
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Tethys Sea
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The break up of Pangea caused this sea to be almost completely covered by India and to be swallowed by the Indian Ocean. All that remains is the Mediterranean sea
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When did life first get onto land?
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Arthropods. During Slurian time.
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Law of Crosscutting
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the principle that a fault or body of rock is younger than any other body of rock that it cuts through
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Age of the Universe
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15-18 Billion years oldAge is based on evolution of starsour galaxy is less than 10 billionSun formed by the collapse of a super nova and created a solar nebulaGasses became liquids, liquids became solidsSolids interact and become larger bodiesSolid grains, asteroids, planets: 50 solar nebulae condensed into the sun and planets
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The essence of radiometric dating
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1. We find rocks that contain radioactive isotopes (mostly igneous rocks)
2. We measure the amount of parent and daughter elements in them.
3. We count how many half lives have passed since minerals in rock formed.
4. We then calculate the age of the rock.
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what could end a snowball earth?
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with volcanism, gradually build up CO2 levels, take around 10 million years
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Linnaean Classification of Life on Earth
Understand how living things are classified.
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Species are referred to using a two-part Latin name consisting
of a genus name followed by a species name. This is called
binominal nomenclature.
Binominal nomenclature - A technique of identifying organisms
using a two-part Latin name, a genus name followed by a species
name. The Latin names are set off from ordinary text using italics
or underlining.
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Horse Evolution and what caused the changes
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Began to get bigger because of prevalent grasses
non stop growing teeth w/multiple enamal layers to chew lots of grass.
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What are the names of the two types of archean rock assemblages?
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Gneiss Belts, and Greenstone Belts
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What groups were hit hard in the Permian extinction event?
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Animals that were hit the hardest were the therapsids (the reptile-like mammals) possibly because they were high on the food chain. They died not only because of environmental changes, but because of starvation. Over 75% percent became extinct. All species were impacted though. The total extinction came out to be 80-85%
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