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Evolutionary biology is the subfield of biology that studies the evolutionary processes (natural selection, common descent, speciation) that produced the diversity of life on Earth. It is also defined as the study of the history of life forms on Earth.
Evolution is the change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. [1] [2] It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, resulting in certain characteristics becoming more or less common within a population over successive generations. [3]
The term paraphyly, or paraphyletic, derives from the two Ancient Greek words παρά (pará), meaning "beside, near", and φῦλον (phûlon), meaning "genus, species", [2] [3] and refers to the situation in which one or several monophyletic subgroups of organisms (e.g., genera, species) are left apart from all other descendants of a unique common ancestor.
In evolutionary biology, function is the reason some object or process occurred in a system that evolved through natural selection.That reason is typically that it achieves some result, such as that chlorophyll helps to capture the energy of sunlight in photosynthesis.
Molecular biology – study of biology and biological functions at the molecular level, with some cross over from biochemistry. Structural biology – a branch of molecular biology, biochemistry, and biophysics concerned with the molecular structure of biological macromolecules. Health sciences and human biology – biology of humans.
An alternative definition does not require any members of a crown group to be extant, only to have resulted from a "major cladogenesis event". [6] The first definition forms the basis of this article. Often, the crown group is given the designation "crown-", to separate it from the group as commonly defined.
They can glide as far as 70 metres (230 ft) with minimal loss of height. They have the most developed propatagium out of any gliding mammal with a mean launch velocity of approximately 3.7 m/s; [62] the Mayan Colugo has been known to initiate glides without jumping. [10]