AP Biology Evolution

  • A New Naming System

    A New Naming System
    Carolus Linnaeus, a Swedish scientist, published Systema Naturae, which includes the common modern naming system of binomial nomenclature, or the naming of species with two names.
  • Birth of Paleontology

    Birth of Paleontology
    Georges Cuvier, a highly respected French scientist, was born, He is known as the father of Paleontology. Also well known for his denial of any sort of evolutionary theory, by his study of the fossil record.
  • Gradualism Thoery

    Gradualism Thoery
    James Hutton, a scottish geologist, proposes his theory of gradualism, which is a theory which holds that profound change is the cumulative product of slow but continuous processes.
  • First Theory of Evolution Published

    First Theory of Evolution Published
    Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, a French naturalist, published his theory of evolution. His theory was that evolution occurred through the inheritance of acquired characteristics, or the use/disuse theory.
  • A New World

    A New World
    Charles Darwin joins the voyage of the HMS Beagle as a naturalist.
  • Darwin's Notes

    Darwin's Notes
    Charles Darwin made notes on the origins of species.
  • Competition for Evolution

    Competition for Evolution
    Alfred Russel Wallace publishes a paper coming to some of the same conclusions as Darwin, including natural selection. Darwin's friends present both Wallace's and Darwin's theories at the Linnean Society.
  • The Origin of Species

    The Origin of Species
    Darwin published the first edition of "The Origins of Species" that speculated abot how natural selection may occur.
  • Heredity Experimentation

    Heredity Experimentation
    Mendel's works with pea plants published, setting the background for the basis of natural selection.
  • Miecher isolated DNA

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  • Importance of DNA in Heredity

    Importance of DNA in Heredity
    August Weismann publishes findings detailing how important DNA is to heredity, along with germ cell theory - the theory that inheritance only takes place by means of germ cells such as egg and sperm, and that other cells do not pass on their genes.
  • Chromosome and Heredity

    Chromosome and Heredity
    Walter Sutton proposed that chromosomes were the basis for Mendelian inheritance of characteristics.
  • Genetic Material Verified

    DNA is proven to be the genetic material by which inheritance passes from one generation to the next, and thus is the blueprint for evolution.