article_snippet: These look for changes within DNA to calculate the mutation rate and so the time it took for species to evolve.
article_snippet: it can also show when different species split from one another.
article_snippet: Combined with the fossil record, the technology is helping to provide a far more detailed view of how life on the Earth is related and how the technology evolved.
article_snippet: Major extinction events, like the demise of the dinosaurs, are thought to have been crucial in allowing life to undergo rapid periods of change as new species appeared to fill the gaps left by those that had died out.
highlights_snippet: These analyse mutations in DNA  to calculate when species evolved apart .
  
highlights_snippet: These analyse mutations in DNA  to calculate when species evolved apart .
   