History of Life on Earth

Key Vocabulary
- Macroevolution: major evolutionary change. The term applies mainly to the
evolution of whole taxonomic groups over long periods of time.
- Protobionts: possibly been the precursors to prokaryotic cells. A protobiont is an
aggregate of abiotically produced organic molecules surrounded by a membrane or a
membrane-like structure
- Radiometric dating: a technique used to date materials such as rocks or carbon,
in which trace radioactive impurities were selectively incorporated when they were
formed.
- Archaeomagnetic dating:
- Half Life: time required for half of an isotope to decay; parent isotope decays into
daughter isotope
- Magnetism Dating: Reversals of the magnetic poles leave their record on rocks
throughout the world
- Stromatolites: Oldest known fossils made of layers of bacteria and sediments
- Tetrapods: 4 limbed vertebrates
- Continental Drift: the gradual movement of the continents across the earth's
surface through geological time
- Adaptive radiation: the diversification of a group of organisms into forms filling
different ecological niches
- Heterochrony: a developmental change in the timing or rate of events, leading to
changes in size and shape
- Paedomorphosis: evolutionary process in which larval or juvenile features of an
ancestral organism are displaced to the adult forms of its descendants
- Homeotic Genes: genes which regulate the development of anatomical
structures in various organisms such as insects, mammals, and plants.
- Hox Genes: related genes that control the body plan of an embryo
- Cambrian Explosion: the sudden appearance in the fossil record of complex
animals with mineralized skeletal remains.

Key Information

-Oldest fossils of eukaryotic cells date back 2.1 billion years

-Earth was formed about 4.6 billion years ago

-First genetic material was probably RNA

Timeline of Life
Prokaryotes(Single Celled)
3.5 Billion Years Ago
Eukaryotes (Single Celled)
2.1 Billion Years Ago
Eukaryotes (Multicelled)
1.2 Billion Years Ago
Cambrian Explosion
530 Million Years Ago
Colonization of land by fungi,plants,and animals
500 Million Years Ago

1st Potential Cell Production Stages: Abiotic synthesis of small organic molecules >>
molecules join to form macromolecules >> molecules packaged into protobionts >> origin of
self-replicating molecules