Calculating Sequence Divergence Analysis Questions

Name:______

Date:______

Period:____

Standard(s):

  • BI.7 a. Students know why natural selection acts on the phenotype rather than the genotype of an organism.
  • BI. 8. a. Students know how natural selection determines the differential survival of groups of organisms.
  • BI. 8. b. Students know a great diversity of species increase the chance that at least some organisms will survive major changes in the environment
  • BI. 8. e Students know how to analyze fossil evidence with regard to biological diversity, episodic speciation, and mass extinction.

Learning Objective (s):

SWBAT…

  • Explain how natural selection determines the differential survival of groups of organisms.
  • Analyze multiple sources of evidence for evolution.
  • Explain how a great diversity of species increase the chance that at least some organisms will survive major changes in the environment
  • Analyze fossil evidence with regard to biological diversity, episodic speciation, and mass extinction.

Directions:

  1. Using your data from the worksheet answer fill out the table and answer the following questions.
  2. Examine the sequences in question and count the differences between them.
  3. Divide the number of differences between the two sequences by the total length of thesequence to get the proportion sequence divergence. To get the percent sequence divergence, multiply the proportion by 100.

Sequence Divergence (Percentage)

Human-Chimp / Chimp-Baboon / Human-Baboon / Chimp-Gorilla / Human-Gorilla / Gorilla-Baboon
12.8% / 12% / 13%

Analysis Questions:

  • Answer the questions below in complete sentences.
  • You may use the resources below to do this.

Resources:

Questions:

1.)Based on your calculations which species were the most closely related? Which species had the largest amount of sequence divergence?

2.) How does this information provide evidence to support the evolution of humans?

3.)Using the following data for sequence divergence in the data table above complete an evolutionary history family tree (phylogenetic tree) by placing the most closely related species close to each other and the most distantly related further away from each other.