Download ISCI FINAL EXAM

ISCI FINAL EXAM
Study Guide
1) Don’t for get to review the geologic time scale, including the numerical ages of the boundaries and the fossils
characteristic of each one.
2) Review to old tests. The questions will generally not simply be lifted from those tests, but every question on the
comprehensive part of the final will be reworked from the old tests. Remember to try to understand the answers
rather than just trying to memorize them.
NEW MATERIAL
Cells and Basic Life Materials and Processes:
3) What is the definition of life, or what activities do we require of a thing before we call it alive?
4) Be familiar with the various types of organic molecules found in living cells or tissues and give a brief description of
what they are used for.
5) Be able to label the parts of a cell on a diagram and to tell what the basic function of each one is. Contrast the
structure/parts of animal and plant cells.
6) Be able to explain what happens in each phase of the cell cycle, including what happens in each phase of mitosis.
You should be able to answer this as a discussion question, beginning with Gap0, describing each step, and
ending with cytokinesis and return to Gap0. As part of that, be able to describe the appearance of the DNA during
each phase: loose in Gap0, beginning to condense, as chromosomes (and make sure you understand that a
chromosome is 2 exact copies of the DNA, connected at the centromere), and as chromatids in anaphase. Also
pay attention to what happens to the nuclear membrane and when it happens.
7) Review how mutations during mitosis can cause problems in how cells divide in the future.
Genetics:
8) Understand the basic structure of DNA – the phosphate and sugar molecules of the backbone and the bases that
do the coding. As part of this be sure you know which bases will pair and which will not, and how that assures that
exact replication occurs during mitosis. Given a short DNA strand you should be able to sketch how it divides and
replicates, keeping up with which are the original and which the “new” halves of each daughter strand.
9) Make sure you know how the code is translated into proteins, describing each step and using the correct
terminology. Given the genetic code graphic (Table 16.1), be able to determine the sequence of amino acids in a
protein if I give you the base sequence.
10) Be able to describe how meiosis produces gametes (sex cells). Make sure to use the correct terminology at each
step.
11) List and describe the ways that genetic variability arises during meiosis and sexual reproduction.
12) Be familiar with the idea of Mendel’s first “law” – the principle of segregation. Be able to create a contingency
table for a trait with perfect dominance and tell what the expected ratio of phenotypes would be. Be able to
illustrate how the genes on a homologous pair of DNA strands controls this ratio.
13) Be familiar with the idea of Mendel’s second “law” – the principle of independent sorting. Be able to construct a
contingency table for two characters (each with one allele dominant) and predict the expected ratio of phenotypes.
14) Be familiar in very general terms with some of the problems of Mendelian genetics – incomplete dominance, gene
linkages, and so on.
Evolution:
15) Be generally familiar with the observations upon which the hypothesis that things have evolved was based, and
which have been used to test it. Omit the first two in the book – the ones that have to do with natural selection.
16) Be able to explain how Darwin (and Wallace) envisioned natural selection working. Why did Darwin think that
artificial selection was important? In other words, how did he see it as analogous to natural selection?
17) What are some of the criticisms that can be levelled at natural selection as the driving mechanism for evolution?
What is the critical problem with all the examples of natural selection in nature we’ve seen?
Ecology:
18) Define: ecology, population, community, and ecosystem.
19) Contrast population and logistic growth, using a curve of time vs. number of individuals. Indicate what the
carrying capacity is on the graph, and define it.
20) Contrast types I, II, and III populations. Which types do well after environmental disturbance? Which do well in
crowded, stable environments?
21) Over the long term (Figure 21.6a) which type of growth does the human population of Earth resemble? What
about over the shorter term (Figure 21.6b)?
22) In addition to human population growth, what other aspect of our collective behavior threatens to have negative
ecological consequences?
23) Compare and contrast food chains, webs, and pyramids. What do they all describe? What aspect of that does
each one excel at? Give simple examples.
24) Define the various terms used in talking about the feeding structure of a community and give examples of
organisms that do each one: producers, primary consumers, decomposers, etc.
25) Other than food-related interactions, what are other ways that species interact within a community?
26) Describe some terrestrial biomes, paying particular attention to forest and desert biomes. Their geographic
distributions are strongly tied to latitude (Figure 21.15). Why might this be so?
27) What are the three zones of a lake? Describe the conditions in each one and tell what sorts of organisms
(producers, consumers, etc.) might or might not be found in each one.
28) What are the zones of the ocean? How are they similar to those of lakes?
29) Outline the hydrologic (water), carbon, and nitrogen biogeochemical cycles. How are they similar? Dissimilar?
How does carbon enter the biologic part of its cycle? How is it used?
30) Define biomass and explain why a typical mammalian food pyramid has a 90% reduction in biomass at each step.
31) Describe ecological succession and give a couple of examples.