Week 1

Question 1

What are the five characteristics of living organisms?

Answer 1

-They are made up of one or more membrane-bound units called cells
-They store and process information that is heritable
-They replicate (meaning reproduce)
-As populations, they evolve
-They use energy

Question 2

What is a cell?

Answer 2

A highly organized compartment bounded by a plasma membrane that contains chemicals in an aqueous solution

Question 3

Cell Theory

Answer 3

States that all organisms are made of cells and all cells come from pre-existing cells

Question 4

What are the essential features of cells

Answer 4

-Cells contains molecular information that encodes their physical attributes
-cells have boundary between them and the environment
-cells have the ability to harness materials and/or energy

Question 5

What is a virus?

Answer 5

A virus is an agent that infects cells and uses the cellular machinery of a host to replicate
-have the ability to store and transmit info
-cannot independently replicate or independently harness energy
-not considered living

Question 6

Def: Prediction

Answer 6

something that can be measured and must be correct if a hypothesis is valid

Question 7

Describe the maggot experiment for cell theory

Answer 7

observation: maggots appear in meat when it is left out
Null hypothesis: maggots arise spontaneously
alternative hypothesis: flies lay eggs on meat which gor into maggots
procedure: one open jar with meat, one gauzed covered jar
results: no maggot in covered jar, maggots in open jar

Question 8

Describe the broth flask experiement

Answer 8

Tested same hypothesis as maggots experiment
procedure: broth seperated into two flasks and boiled to kill all preexisting life. One flask contains long neck to create seal
Results: bacteria grows in the exposed jar

Question 9

Def: positive control

Answer 9

a control that confirms an assumption is true

Question 10

Def: Negative control

Answer 10

a control which evaluates the consequences of removing variables

Question 11

What are the implications of cell theory

Answer 11

Because all cells come form preexisting cells, all individuals in a population are related by common ancestry

Question 12

What is an exception to cell theory

Answer 12

The last universal common ancestor because there was no preexisting cell to be derived from

Question 13

Why do cells exist

Answer 13

-They concentrate and compartmentalize reagents for biological reactions
-They make chemical gradients that can be used to store energy
-link a phenotype to the same physical space as the genotype that encodes it (allowing natural selection to occur)

Question 14

Darwin and Wallaces proposal on the theory of evolution

Answer 14

they proposed that all species are related by common ancestry and the characteristics of species can change from generation to generation

Question 15

The theory of evolution

Answer 15

The theory of evolution postulates that:
-species are related to one another and species can change through time

Question 16

Def: Fitness

Answer 16

the ability of an individual to produce offspring as compared to other individuals of the same species

Question 17

Def: Natural Selection

Answer 17

the process by which spices change because some individuals are able to produce more offspring than other individuals

Question 18

Adaptations two meanings

Answer 18

It is a characteristic that increases the fitness of an individual in a particular environment or it is a process of species acquiring fitness-improving traits over time

Question 19

Criteria for natural selection to occur

Answer 19

variation, heritability, and influence on fitness

Question 20

natural selection vs evolutionary change

Answer 20

natural selection acts on individuals, evolutionary change affects overall populations

Question 21

Central dogma

Answer 21

the informational flow in biological systems consisting of DNA replication, RNA transcription and protein translation

Question 22

What is speciation

Answer 22

when an ancestor over time splits into two descendants that are no longer reproductively compatible

Question 23

What is the tree of life

Answer 23

a diagram that depicts relationships among species
(Cannot be observed, must be inferred from data)

Question 24

Estimating the Tree of Life

Answer 24

Molecular variation in nucleotides offers information for understanding the evolutionary relationships among all organsims. Nucleotide sequencing should be similar in closely related organisms but less similar in organisms that are less closely related

Question 25

What are the three domains

Answer 25

Bacteria, archaea and eukarya

Question 26

What is a node and tip on a tree of life

Answer 26

a represents a common ancestor to two separate taxons and the tip is the end of the tree that leads to taxons

Question 27

Differences between prokaryote cells and eukaryote cells

Answer 27

prokaryotes contain no mitochondria or nucleus

Question 28

What is the order of Taxonomic classifications

Answer 28

Domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, species

Question 29

Def: Artificial Selection

Answer 29

Form of natural selection where humans drive the course of evolution

Question 30

Def: Unintended artificial selection

Answer 30

Human predation targets biggest or strongest leading to evolutionary changes in populations to become smaller on average or mature earlier in addition to other behavioral responses

Question 31

Evidence of evolution

Answer 31

change through time (artificial selection), extinction (through fossils), vestigial traits, inter-relatedness, transitional forms

Question 32

Evidence of natural selection

Answer 32

antibiotic resistance, beak size changes

Question 33

Geographical continuity

Answer 33

extinct fossils are typically succeeded in the same region by similar living species. species located in similar area tend to be more closely related than species located in other regions