By: ****

 Born on February 12, 1809 in Shropshire, England  Died on April 19, 1882  Son of a wealthy society doctor and financier  Darwin’s father originally wanted Darwin to become a doctor, but Darwin found the subject to be very boring  Darwin’s interest in the natural world grew as he enjoyed riding and hunting  Darwin then began to study nature in Cambridge  After this course, Darwin was presented with the preposition of sailing with Captain Robert FitzRoy on the HMS Beagle  Darwin’s father strongly objected the trip, but was convinced by his brother-in-law

 The trip was originally planned for two years, but lasted more than five years  Darwin acted as a naturalist and a geologist on the trip  The HMS Beagle first sailed to the Atlantic and then to South America  Darwin spent most of his time exploring the lands  The most famous stop of the Beagle was the Galapagos Islands

 Book published by Darwin to explain his theory of evolution  Through his observations, Darwin had theorized about evolution; however, he did not know the true factors that determined evolution  Darwin made several points in his book: ◦ Every species is fertile enough that if all offspring survived the population would grow ◦ Despite periodic fluctuations, populations roughly remain the same size ◦ Resources are limited and relatively stable over time ◦ Struggle for survive keeps the population in check ◦ Individuals of a population vary greatly from each other ◦ Individuals less suited for the environment are less likely to survive and less likely to reproduce, individuals that are more suited for the environment reproduce and pass traits to next generation: theory of natural selection ◦ Much of the variations are inherited ◦ These variations accumulated over time and eventually produce brand new species

 Born on July 20, 1822 in Austrian Empire  Died on January 6, 1884  Was a Augustinian priest and scientist  Mendel was the first to study the science of genetics through inheritance of certain traits in pea plants  Mendel’s work explained how evolution worked  Mendel concluded: ◦ Two factors for each trait ◦ Factors may not contain the same information ◦ If the two factors are the same it is known as homozygous, if different it is known as heterozyguos ◦ The genotype of an individuals is determined by the number of alleles and the phenotype is the individuals physical characteristics

 Evolution is determined by heredity or the traits that an individual receives from parents  These traits determine the individual’s fitness or ability to survive: Survival of the Fittest  In order from new traits to appear, whether beneficial or harmful, in a organism it can happen through mutations or gene shuffling