For something to be alive, it has to have/be able to maintain... - Answers anatomy, metabolism,
homeostasis, responsiveness, adaptability, reproduction
Spontaneous generation - Answers living organisms can spring, fully formed, from non-living
matter...not true
Francesco Redi - Answers Italian physicist, "father of experimental biology, rotting meat in jars -
-> spontaneous generation debunked
Anton van Leewenhoek - Answers invented microscope, revealed microscopic life, caused
spontaneous generation to be looked at again
Georges Buffon - Answers curator of King's Garden in Paris, said that earth and solar system
arose from natural processes, everything is composed of the same "particles"
John Needham - Answers boiling broth experiments, thought that a "life force" existed in the
flasks that allowed for spontaneous generation
Lazaro Spallanzani - Answers more broth experiments, saw that only the unsealed flask
produced microorganisms, many could not replicate his experiments, critics said "only air is
necessary for spontaneous generation
Louis Pasteur - Answers swan-necked flask experiments, only flask with no curved bacteria trap
became cloudy, put controversy to rest
Proteins - Answers polymers of amino acids
Nucleic acids - Answers polymers of nucleotides
Carbohydrates - Answers polymers of sugars
Fats - Answers polymers of fatty acids
Protocell - Answers a membrane surrounding an internal space containing fluid different from
its surrounding medium
Abiogenisis - Answers the origin of life from inorganic precursors
Aleksandr Oparin - Answers published "The Origin of Life", said that chemical rxns in the early
oceans could have generated life, studied how organic molecules affected early life
Colloid - Answers when organic molecules in aqueous solutions disperse uniformly in the water
Coacervates - Answers when organic molecules in an aqueous solution form microscopic,
spherical droplets
, Stanly Miller - Answers constructed an apparatus that was designed to simulate the conditions
of primordial oceans, samples of water yielded organic molecules formed from inorganic
components
Components of primordial atmosphere - Answers carbon dioxide, water vapor, hydrogen,
nitrogen, ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, carbon monoxide, methane
Reducing atmoshphere - Answers oxidation is prevented by removal of oxygen, early
atmosphere was only weakly reducing
RNA World Hypothesis - Answers RNA was the original genetic material: it is simpler than DNA
to construct from raw materials, has enzymatic properties (ribozyme activity) and can modify
itself and self-replicate, can be reverse transcribed to more stable DNA
Ribozyme - Answers ribonucleic acid enzymes, RNA molecules that can catalyze specific
reactions
Extinction can be driven by... - Answers species interactions, ecosystem changes at the local
level, climate change, glaciation, changes in sea level
Late Ordovician Extinction - Answers 440 mya, mass extinction of small marine organisms
Late Devonian Extinction - Answers 365 mya, large-scale extinction of tropical marine species
Permian-Triassic Extinction - Answers 250 mya, 96% of marine animals died off, hurt terrestrial
animals too, began after massive volcanic eruptions --> lava and ash directly causes death, CO2
raised temperatures, less water cycling --> reducing ocean constant (ocean anoxia), anaerobic
bacterial overgrowth in oceans --> H2S concentrations increased
Late Triassic Extinction - Answers 210 mya, extinction of many terrestrial vertebrates -->
dinosaurs and plants flourished
Cretaceous-Tertiary (K-T) Extinction - Answers 65.5 mya, 75% of plants and animals died off,
non-avian dinosaurs left, end of the Cretaceous period --> start of Tertiary, >50% marine species
died off, caused by massive comet
Anthropocene Extinction - Answers current 6th mass exinction, extinction rate is 1000 times
higher than when a mass extinction isn't occurring
Prokaryotes - Answers lack membrane bound organelles or nuclei, many have internal
membrane systems
Carl Woese, et al. - Answers introduced the three domain system, based on synapomorphic
rRNA sequences, said that RNA was the first nucleic acid to evolve --> inspiration for RNA world
hypothesis
Earliest known fossil organisms... - Answers archaeans