NEET BIOLOGY

Detailed explanation-1: -English naturalist Charles Darwin developed the idea of natural selection after a five-year voyage to study plants, animals, and fossils in South America and on islands in the Pacific. In 1859, he brought the idea of natural selection to the attention of the world in his best-selling book, On the Origin of Species.

Detailed explanation-2: -The mechanism that Darwin proposed for evolution is natural selection. Because resources are limited in nature, organisms with heritable traits that favor survival and reproduction will tend to leave more offspring than their peers, causing the traits to increase in frequency over generations.

Detailed explanation-3: -The adaptations he saw in the finches and tortoises on the Galapagos Islands struck him particularly acutely. Darwin concluded that species change through natural selection, or-to use Wallace’s phrase-through “the survival of the fittest” in a given environment.

Detailed explanation-4: -Pre-Darwinian ideas about evolution A visit to the Galapagos Islands in 1835 helped Darwin formulate his ideas on natural selection. He found several species of finch adapted to different environmental niches. The finches also differed in beak shape, food source, and how food was captured.