In Australia, marsupials and placental mammals have evolved to share many similar characteristics. This type of evolution may be referred to as

Solution & Explanation

Answer: (D) Convergent Evolution. In Australia, marsupials and placental mammals independently evolved many similar features (e.g., placental wolf and Tasmanian wolf-marsupial). When unrelated lineages in different habitats acquire similar adaptive features for the same function, NCERT calls this convergent evolution. Although each group also shows adaptive radiation, the sharing of similar characteristics between the two separate groups is specifically convergent evolution. NCERT Reference: Ch 6 Evolution, p.118, lines 3–9: "one can call this convergent evolution. Placental mammals in Australia also exhibit adaptive radiation in evolving into varieties of such placental mammals each of which appears to be 'similar' to a corresponding marsupial (e.g., Placental wolf and Tasmanian wolf-marsupial)."