Increasing Specialization Of Structure And Function Among Animals

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chikis

Registered Senior Member
Please who can help with this question. Am confused and stucked in it. I need help please. Any one who have any idea concerning the question; let him bring in his idea let's discuss:
Increasing specialization of structure and function among animals of the same class or order for survival in a new and different environment is called A. adaptive radiation B. phylogeny C. homology D. analogy E. ontogeny.
The A-E options are confusing. If anyone has an idea concerning the question, please let him bring it in, let's discuss it and see if we can arrive at the correct answer. Thank you.
 
Shared ancestry can be evolutionary or developmental. Evolutionary ancestry means that structures evolved from some structure in a common ancestor; for example, the wings of bats and the arms of primates are homologous in this sense. Developmental ancestry means that structures arose from the same tissue in embryonal development; the ovaries of female humans and the testicles of male humans are homologous in this sense.

Homology is different from analogy, which describes the relation between characters that are apparently similar yet phylogenetically independent. The wings of a maple seed and the wings of an albatross are analogous but not homologous (they both allow the organism to travel on the wind, but they didn't both develop from the same structure). Analogy is commonly also referred to as homoplasy, which is further distinguished into parallelism, reversal, and convergence.
 
cosmictraveler said:
Shared ancestry can be evolutionary or developmental. Evolutionary ancestry means that structures evolved from some structure in a common ancestor; for example, the wings of bats and the arms of primates are homologous in this sense. Developmental ancestry means that structures arose from the same tissue in embryonal development; the ovaries of female humans and the testicles of male humans are homologous in this sense.

Homology is different from analogy, which describes the relation between characters that are apparently similar yet phylogenetically independent. The wings of a maple seed and the wings of an albatross are analogous but not homologous (they both allow the organism to travel on the wind, but they didn't both develop from the same structure). Analogy is commonly also referred to as homoplasy, which is further distinguished into parallelism, reversal, and convergence.
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So what is your final conclusion?
 
chikis said:
Please who can help with this question. Am confused and stucked in it. I need help please. Any one who have any idea concerning the question; let him bring in his idea let's discuss:
Increasing specialization of structure and function among animals of the same class or order for survival in a new and different environment is called A. adaptive radiation B. phylogeny C. homology D. analogy E. ontogeny.
The A-E options are confusing. If anyone has an idea concerning the question, please let him bring it in, let's discuss it and see if we can arrive at the correct answer. Thank you.
Click to expand...

That is adaptive radiation through ontogeny.
Adaptive radiation is the process by which a population spreads through and fills in all the niches it can. It may or may not speciate in this process.
Darwin's finches are an example of this.

Ontogeny is the process of development of simple into more complex structure. It is usually applied to growth, but it can also be used [though it rare is used] to describe the specialisation of the morphology of speices/sub-species.
Water spiders are an example of this [so is a growing child].

The answer is A. If its multi choice, include E too.
 
A is not a particularly good answer to the question; however, B, C, D and E are all clearly wrong, so A is the winner by a process of elimination.

If we think about an adaptive radiation, it consists of a prolifferation if lineages withing an order, for example, usually filling up previously empty (or recently emptied) ecological niches. For example, some time after the Panamanian land bridge opened around 3.0 - 3.5 million years ago, a single species of cervid, probably a member of the genus Odocoileus, crossed over from North America to South America, where, in a relatively short time, it radiated into 5 different genera: Blastoceros, Ozotoceros, Mazama, Pudu and Hippocamelus (to name just the living genera). In addition, there are a few extinct genera as well, like Morenelaphus and others.

Now, the original question would seem to apply to a single lineage, with several successive species, and not include all of the genera evolving simultaneously as a unitary phenomenon. That's why I don't particularly like A as it is worded.

Rich
 
In my own opinion, I think is the correct answer to the question A. The word 'adptation' is enough to define the term without adding radiation. That 'radiation' is just there to cause confusion to some beginners.
 
chikis said:
In my own opinion, I think is the correct answer to the question A. The word 'adptation' is enough to define the term without adding radiation. That 'radiation' is just there to cause confusion to some beginners.
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No, radiation is used to indicate that the population spreads into and occupies niches previously empty or occupied by other populations.
 
No, an adaptive radiation is not about geographic expansion, although that sometimes accompanies such a radiation. An adaptive radiation is the proliferation of taxa, begining with one arrival, then an in situ splitting of lineages into many, all living in the same area (on some scale) but partitioning the environment so as to avoid direct competition by specializing on different foods, or occupying different micro-environments, or differing their behaviours.
 
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