Concept
Version 7
Created by Boundless
Distinguishing between Similar Traits
Analogous structures
The (c) wing of a honeybee is similar in shape to a (b) bird wing and (a) bat wing, and it serves the same function. However, the honeybee wing is not composed of bones and has a distinctly-different structure and embryonic origin. These wing types (insect versus bat and bird) illustrate an analogy: similar structures that do not share an evolutionary history.
Source
Boundless vets and curates high-quality, openly licensed content from around the Internet. This particular resource used the following sources:
"OpenStax College, Determining Evolutionary Relationships. October 16, 2013."
http://cnx.org/content/m44591/latest/Figure_20_02_02.jpg
OpenStax CNX
CC BY 3.0.