Download UNIT 1: INTRODUCTION TO BIOLOGY

San Diego Mesa College
General Biology Laboratory (Bio107L)
Instructor: Elmar Schmid, Ph.D.
Key topics to study in preparation for the Midterm Exam
Exercise 1: Orientation – Metric System

know the seven scientific basic units of the International Metric System, e.g. gram, liter,

show familiarity with the sub-units, e.g. milli, micro, deci, etc., conversions

be able to make conversions between subunits of the International Metric System, e.g.
m into cm; mm into dm, etc.
Exercise 2: Introduction to the scientific method
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know the purpose and steps of the scientific method
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know the difference between hypothesis and theory
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know the purpose of controls in scientific inquiry. What is a “controlled experiment”?
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know the difference between inductive and empirical approach in scientific inquiry

rehearse the lab tools used to measure and/or transfer liquids in a lab, e.g. pipettes,
graduated cylinders, volumetric flasks, etc.
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Celsius temperature scale. Standardized by what?
Exercise 3: Windows to a microscopic world
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Know the difference between magnification and resolution
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What is the limit of resolution of the human eye? Hint: 0.1 mm

know the major microscope components and especially the individual lenses by name
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magnification factors of the different objective lenses and of the ocular lens
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know how to calculate the total magnification strength of a compound light microscope,
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know the definition of the field of view & depth of view

rehearse the hall mark features of the different cell types (animal, plant, fungi, protists,
bacteria), e.g. cell wall, nucleus, organelles, size differences
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know the difference between prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells (size, location of DNA)
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know important cell organelles, size differences, the names of the used cell staining
dyes (animal vs. plant cells)
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know the major components of important cell structures, such as cell membrane,
chromosomes, and plant cell wall

know the names and uses of important cell stains, e.g. Lugols’ reagent.
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San Diego Mesa College
General Biology Laboratory (Bio107L)
Instructor: Elmar Schmid, Ph.D.
Exercise 4: Diffusion & Osmosis

know the difference between covalent, ionic and hydrogen bonds

know the chemical structure and the important physical properties of water, such as
adhesion, capillarity, heating capacity and pH

know the difference between diffusion and osmosis and why both processes play an
important in biological organisms. Be able to name examples.

know which factors influence the diffusion rate and in which way.

know the difference between isotonic, hypotonic and hypertonic solutions and their
impact on living cells

know the definition of osmosis.

Be able to explain why the plasma membrane of cells is a semi-permeable structure
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Know which molecules can freely permeate biological membranes

Rehearse the components of the diffusion tube apparatus and their functions

Rehearse the meaning of osmolarity to cell volume. What happens to cells brought into
solutions with different tonicities?
Exercise 5: Enzymes

Know what enzymes are and which role they play in living organisms? Know the name
of our lab enzyme.

What is the biological function of enzymes? What means catalysis? What means
denaturation?

Know which factors, e.g. pH, temperature, influence enzyme activity and in which way

What do enzyme inhibitors do? Which types of enzyme inhibitors are known (hint:
competitive versus non-competitive)

What is the active site of enzymes? What happens there? What means substrate?

Know the different components of a spectrophotometer and in which way we used it to
measure the activity of our lab enzyme
Exercise 6 & 7: Metabolic Rate & Cellular Respiration

Know the net equation of cellular respiration

Know the definition of metabolic rate (MR)

Rehearse the found differences between the MR of a human, mouse, rat and of an
amphibian, e.g. a frog, and be able to explain it

Which equipment did we use to measure the MR of our lab mice and rats?
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San Diego Mesa College
General Biology Laboratory (Bio107L)
Instructor: Elmar Schmid, Ph.D.

Know the function of the components of the respiration chamber equipment, e.g. soda
lime

Know the difference between an endothermic and ectothermic life form regarding MR

Know the caloric contents of major food molecules, e.g. glucose, fats, proteins, fiber
and water
Exercise 8: Photosynthesis

Know the net equation of photosynthesis
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Know the carbon source for the sugars produced during photosynthesis

Know the name of the pH indicator used during one important experiment in this lab

Know the names of groups of life forms performing photosynthesis

Know the location of chlorophyll in a plant cell

Know the names and colors of the most important photosynthesis pigments

Know which qualities of light is/are absorbed by chlorophyll molecules

Rehearse the steps and experimental outcome of the paper chromatography technique.
What does it do? How many pigments were identified? Their names and color.

Understand why we used phenol red to indirectly observe the uptake of carbon dioxide
by a plant cell. Rehearse the carbonate buffer system.

What are stomata? What is their function in plants?
Exercise 11: DNA, Gene Replication, DNA Transcription & Protein Translation

What is a nucleotide? What are its components? Which nucleotides are found in DNA?
Which ones in RNA?

Be able to name the crucial steps, enzymes and events of DNA replication. Which enzymes
are involved? Where does it take place?

Be able to name the crucial steps, enzymes and events of DNA transcription. Which
enzyme copies DNA into a single-stranded messenger RNA? Where does it take place?
What is the name of the end product?

Know where protein translation takes place and which components are necessary. (hint:
ribosome, rRNA, tRNA, mRNA)

Rehearse the genetic code. Know that it is a triplet code and that 3 nucleotides code for
one amino acid.

Be able to read the code and to predict the amino acid sequence of a given mRNA strand
sequence.
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