Galapagos Evolution

• States that species change over time

• Living things evolve in response to environmental changes

• Based on the idea that all species are related and gradually change over time

• The "Father of Evolution"

• Introduced theory in his book, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection in 1859

• Famous work is observing finches in the Galapagos Islands

Charles Darwin observed birds known as finches

Darwin observed that beak shape varies among finch species. He postulated that the beak of an ancestral species had adapted over time to equip the finches to acquire different food sources.

• The process where the process where organisms better adapted to their environment tend to survive and produce more offspring

• As random genetic mutations occur within an organism's genetic code, the beneficial mutations are preserved because they aid survival

• Beneficial mutations are passed on to the next generation

• Over time, beneficial mutations accumulate and the result is an entirely different organism