Day 10: Evolution a New Unit!

We learned about the fossil record and how fossils are made today. We discussed our homework which was to read some chapters out of Your Inner Fish which is about evolution and how the early life forms of fish progressed to being land animals, which eventually evolved to be humans.

This is a picture of the Fossil that the author Neil Shubin found in the Arctic:

This is a transitional fossil discovery. Previously to the discovery of this fossil there was discoveries of ancient fish and a discovery of a type of first reptile called Hynerpeton.

They looked for the fossils in the Arctic and Ellesmere island because of geological research and the historic continental drift showing that the tropical equator continent from 375 million years ago moved north over time. They wanted to explore an unknown region and didn't go looking in the very surveyed east region of Greenland.

The evidence found of evolution in this fossil was immense:

• In the arms of this fish it showed the transition from ray bones in a fish to the formula us humans and other mammals have which is one bone- two bones and lots of phalanges in the front. 
• The Tiktaalik had eyes on the top of his flat head unlike fish to better see with, when not always submerged. 
• The Tiktaalik's ability to push itself up is due to the movement thru the probably rough terrain and escape from predators thus developing an important factor of natural selection and evolution.