Question

What is adaptive radiation? Explain with an example.
Class XII
Evolution

Answer 1

Adaptive radiation, evolution of an animal or plant group into a wide variety of types adapted to specialized modes of life. Adaptive radiations are best exemplified in closely related groups that have evolved in a relatively short time. A striking example is the radiation, beginning in the Paleogene Period (beginning 65.5 million years ago), of basal mammalian stock into forms adapted to running, leaping, climbing, swimming, and flying. Other examples include.
Australian marsupials, cichlid fish, and Darwin’s finches (also known as Galapagos finches).

Answer 2

the diversification of a group of an organism into forms filling different ecological niches
OR
adaptive radiation describes the rapid evolutionary diversification of single ancestral line it occurs when a members of a species occupy a variety of distinct niches with environmental conditions
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