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Standards Index: LS4.C: Adaptation

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  • Natural selection leads to adaptation, that is, to a population dominated by organisms that are anatomically, behaviorally, and physiologically well suited to survive and reproduce in a specific environment. That is, the differential survival and reproduction of organisms in a population that have an advantageous heritable trait leads to an increase in the proportion of individuals in future generations that have the trait and to a decrease in the proportion of individuals that do not.
  • Adaptation also means that the distribution of traits in a population can change when conditions change.
Image from The Birth of the Environmental Movement: DDT and Rachel Carson
Video

The Birth of the Environmental Movement: DDT and Rachel Carson

Students will learn how the U.S. government came to develop environmental protection policies and what that means today as we struggle to balance the risk between pesticides and disease.