Paleontology - Key terms



AEROBIC:

Oxygen-breathing.

AMPHIBIAN:

A creature capable of living either in the water or on solid ground.

ANAEROBIC:

Non-oxygen-breathing.

CARNIVORE:

A meat-eating organism.

EON:

The longest phase of geologic time. Earth's history has consisted of four eons, the Hadean, Archaean, Proterozoic, and Phanerozoic. The next-smallest subdivision of geologic time is the era.

EPOCH:

The fourth-longest phase of geologic time, shorter than an era. The current epoch is the Holocene, which began about 10,000 years ago.

ERA:

The second-longest phase of geologic time, after an eon. The current eon, the Phanerozoic, has had three eras, the Paleozoic, Mesozoic, and Cenozoic, which is the current era. The next-smallest subdivision of geologic time is the period.

EUKARYOTE:

A cell that has a nucleus and organelles (sections of the cell that perform specific functions) bound bymembranes.

FOOD CHAIN:

A series of singular organisms in which each plant or animal depends on the organism that precedes it. Food chains rarely exist in nature; therefore, scientists prefer the term food web.

FOOD WEB:

A term describing the interaction of plants, herbivores, carnivores, omnivores, decomposers, and detritivores in an ecosystem. Each of these organisms consumes nutrients and passes them along to other organisms (or, in the case of the decomposer food web, to the soil and environment). The food web may be thought of as a bundle or network of food chains, but since the latter rarely existseparately, scientists prefer the concept of a food web to that of a food chain.

FOSSIL:

The mineralized remains of any prehistoric life-form, especially those preserved in rock before the end of the lastice age.

FOSSILIZATION:

The process by which a once living organism becomes a fossil. Generally, fossilization involves mineralization of the organism's hard portions, such as bones, teeth, and shells.

GEOLOGIC TIME:

The vast stretch of time over which Earth's geologic development has occurred. This span (about 4.6 billion years) dwarfs the history of human existence, which is only about 2.5 million years. Much smaller still is the span of human civilization, only about 5,500 years.

GYMNOSPERM:

A type of plant that reproduces sexually through the use of seeds that are exposed, not hidden in an ovary as with an angiosperm.

HERBIVORE:

A plant-eating organism.

ICE AGE:

A period of massive and widespread glaciation (the spread of glaciers). Ice ages usually occur in series overstretches of several million or even several hundred million years and have taken place periodically—often in conjunction with mass extinctions—throughout Earth's history.

INVERTEBRATE:

An animal without an internal skeleton.

MASS EXTINCTION:

A phenomenon in which numerous species cease to exist at or about the same time, usually as the result of a natural calamity.

MINERAL:

A naturally occurring, typically inorganic substance with a specific chemical composition and a crystalline structure (that is, a structure in which the constituent parts have a simple and definite geometric arrangement that is repeated in all directions).

MINERALIZATION:

A series of changes experienced by a once living organism during fossilization. In mineralization, minerals in the organism are replaced or augmented by different minerals, or the hard portionsof the organism dissolve completely.

ORGANIC:

At one time chemists used the term organic only in reference to living things. Now the word is applied to most compounds containing carbon, with the exception of carbonates (which are minerals) and oxides, such as carbon dioxide.

PALEOBOTANY:

An area of paleontology involving the study of past plant life.

PALEOECOLOGY:

An area of paleontology devoted to studying the relationships between prehistoric plants and animals and their environments.

PALEONTOLOGY:

The study of life-forms from the distant past, primarily as revealed through the fossilized remains of plants and animals.

PALEOZOOLOGY:

An area of paleontology devoted to the study of prehistoric animal life.

PERIOD:

The third-longest phase of geologic time, after an era. The current eon, the Phanerozoic, has had 11 periods, and the current era, the Cenozoic, has consisted of three periods, of which the most recent is the Quaternary. The next-smallest subdivision of geologic time is the epoch.

PHOTOSYNTHESIS:

The biological conversion of light energy (that is, electromagnetic energy) from the Sun to chemical energy in plants.

PROKARYOTE:

A cell without a nucleus or organelles bound by membranes.

VERTEBRATE:

An animal with an internal skeleton.

Also read article about Paleontology from Wikipedia

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