Understanding Evolution

Your one-stop source for information on evolution

Understanding Evolution

Teaching Resources

Home → Teach Evolution → Lessons and Teaching Tools → Teaching Resources Database → High altitude adaptations: The work of Emilia Huerta-Sánchez

High altitude adaptations: The work of Emilia Huerta-Sánchez

Grade Level(s):

  • 13-16
  • Advanced

Source:

  • UC Museum of Paleontology

Resource type:

  • Research profile

Time: 30 minutes

Overview

This research profile follows statistician and population geneticist Emilia Huerta-Sánchez as she studies the adaptations that allow Tibetan highlanders to live 13,000 feet above sea level without developing altitude sickness.

Go to this resource »

  • [History of life: Grades 13-16] Evolution is still continuing today.
  • [History of life: Grades 13-16] Evolutionary change can sometimes happen rapidly.
  • [Evidence of evolution: Grades 13-16] An organism's features reflect its evolutionary history.
  • [Evidence of evolution: Grades 13-16] There is a fit between organisms and their environments, though not always a perfect fit.
  • [Mechanisms of evolution: Grades 13-16] Evolution is often defined as a change in allele frequencies within a population.
  • [Mechanisms of evolution: Grades 13-16] Evolution results from natural selection acting upon genetic variation within a population.
  • [Mechanisms of evolution: Grades 13-16] New heritable traits can result from mutations.
  • [Mechanisms of evolution: Grades 13-16] Inherited characteristics affect the likelihood of an organism's survival and reproduction.
  • [Mechanisms of evolution: Grades 13-16] Over time, the proportion of individuals with advantageous traits may increase (and the proportion with disadvantageous traits may decrease) due to their chances of surviving and reproducing.
  • [Mechanisms of evolution: Grades 13-16] Traits that confer an advantage may persist in the population and are called adaptations.
  • [Nature of science: Grades 13-16] Scientists use multiple research methods (experiments, observational research, comparative research, and modeling) to collect data.
  • [Nature of science: Grades 13-16] Scientists can test ideas about events and processes long past, very distant, and not directly observable.
  • [Nature of science: Grades 13-16] Scientific findings and evidence inspire new questions and shape the directions of future scientific research.
  • [Nature of science: Grades 13-16] Science is a human endeavor.
  • [Studying evolution: Grades 13-16] Our knowledge of the evolution of living things is always being refined as we gather more evidence.

There are no NGSS/DCI concepts currently linked to this resource.

Use this resource to relate evolutionary concepts to the topic of the regulation of gene expression (or get more suggestions for incorporating evolution throughout your biology syllabus). This research profile includes discussion and essay questions that can be assigned to students. Get tips for using research profiles in your classroom.