A. Multiple Choice Questions. Choose the best possible answer. Use the bubble sheet. (1 pt. each)
1. Recent discoveries of microscopic fossils have extended the known history of life to about (A) a few thousand years ago (B) 3.5 billion years ago (C) 4.5 billion years ago (D) 2 billion years ago (E) a few million years ago.
2. What is an example of deductive reasoning? A) I found a large organ in the body of an animal called a giraffe and have decided to call it a heart. B) This is the seventh time I have dissected a giraffe and it looks like all giraffes have hearts. C) Since giraffes have hearts, the next time I operate on a giraffe, I expect to find a heart. D) Hearts are not only found in giraffes, but also in fish. E) One should not confuse a heart with the liver as to its importance to circulation.
3. The paleontologist Cuvier’s Creation Model had serious flaws because A) although it explained the earth’s strata, it could not explain how they were arranged. B) although it could explain the order of the earth’s strata, it could not explain the order of fossils.
C) although it could explain the age of the earth, it could not predict the age of particular strata. D) although it could explain the progressive arrangement of fossils in strata, it could not explain how some fossils became extinct. E) although it could explain the order of fossils, the explanation of multiple extinctions and creations was not consistent with the Biblical record or the data.
4. What is not true about Archaeopteryx? A) It has traditionally been considered the first bird. B) It is considered a transition fossil between birds and reptiles because its feathers, skull shape, teeth, claws, and tail. C) It fits the concept of a transitional fossil in terms of the time it was supposed to have lived. D) Feathers on Archaeopteryx are primitive in nature and leads scientists to believe it used them for courtship and insulation not flight. E) The pneumatic bones of Archeaopteryx suggest that they were an adaptation for flight.
5. To critics who demanded to see all of the transition species before they would believe in evolution, Darwin said: “I will show you the intermediates, if you will show me every step between a bulldog and a greyhound.” He meant (A) There were no intermediates because of punctuated equilibrium. B) There was instantaneous speciation and thus no intermediates ever existed. C) Those steps were missing because the breeders preferred other dog varieties; they once existed but no longer had survival advantages. D) That plate tectonics would have caused the loss of the specimens E) Greyhounds and bulldogs don’t hybridize well and thus there are few intermediates.
6. Above are two suggested phylogenies. Which statement is incorrect? A) In phylogeny A cetaceans are most closely related to mesonychians. B) A key difference the two phylogenies is that in A pigs are the closest relative of hippos but in the second cetaceans are the closest relative to hippos. C) In both phylogenies hippos and perissodactyls are the most distantly related groups. D) Perissodactlys evolved earliest in time. E) In phylogeny A, camels and ruminanants are more closely related to each other than are pigs and hippopotamids.
7. What would you predict the number of heart chambers to be in a shark? A) four B) three and a half C) three D) two E) None of the above
8. Which structures are homologous? A) Eye of a dog and eye of a fly. B) claw of a lobster and claw of a crayfish C) Dorsal fin of a whale and dorsal fin of a shark. D) Spine of a cactus and the spine of a porcupine E) None of the above
9. Which structures are analogous; i.e. are homoplasies? A) Hair of a dog and the fur of a platypus. B) Heart of a cow and the hoof of a horse C) Eye of a bat and the eye of a snake D) Hand bones of a human and the wing bones of a bat E) None of the above
10. Suppose you found a “cellular entity” that had a cell wall, plasma membrane, a circular chromosome, ribosomes, and RNA, what would be the best reason that you would think that this is a member of the Archea? A) Cell wall B) circular chromosome C) ribosomes D) RNA E) plasma membrane.
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11. Suppose that Fleming Jenkin were right about the blending hypothesis. What would be the situation with the freckle trait, assuming there were no fitness differences due to the condition. A) All people in the world would have freckles. B) All people in the world would lack freckles. C) About 50% of the people would have freckles and 50% would lack them. D) When a person with freckles mated with one a person lacking them, their children would demonstrate a 3:1 ratio of freckles to non-freckles. E) Most people would have some degree of freckling.
12. Mendel bred pure lines of peas which were either tall or short. When he crossbred them, all of the F2 generation plants were tall. When he crossbred two F2 tall plants he found ¾ were tall and ¼ were short. What should he conclude? A) The factors for height merged together. B) The factors for height remained separate somehow. C) The blending hypothesis was right after all. D) The factors for height and flower color were linked together. E) There was independent assortment of factors.
13. Suppose Mendel wanted you to determine what factors a pea plant with purple flowers carried? If you could crossbreed it with any his plants, what would you ask for? A) a pure bred white flowered plant B) a pure bred purple flowered plant C) a hybrid plant showing purple traits D) a hybrid showing white traits E) any flowering plant will do.
14. Mendel knew that Round (R) seeds were dominant over wrinkled (r) and Yellow (Y)was dominant over green (y). Then he made this cross: RrYy X rrYY with these results: 50% of the plants had round yellow seeds and 50% had green yellow seeds. What could you conclude? A) That linkage was probably involved. B) That all of the plants were carrying an allele for the green trait. C) That all of the plants were carrying traits for both recessive alleles. D) That all of the recessive traits were lacking. E) None of the above
15. Imagine a butterfly population with variable wing color and wing flapping speed. Suppose you noted one of the variations was a pleiotropic allele which coded for red wing color and fast wing speed in butterflies. Further imagine that there was a strong selection pressure favoring fast wing speed but that red color was mildly disadvantageous because predators could see butterflies with that color. What do you expect the resulting result to be after a hundred generations? A) Faster butterflies with red color wings. B) Faster butterflies with variable colored wings C) No change in the speed of butterflies because the two factors balance out. D) A modest increase in butterfly speed and butterflies with light red wings. E) None of the above.
16. Why are the chromosome numbers in animals usually even numbers? A) Because they received one haploid set from each parent. B) Because that mitosis could not proceed with odd numbers C) Because that meiosis could not proceed with odd numbers D) polyploidy would result with odd numbers E) None of the above.
17. Suppose in a pea plant that Ry were linked together and rY were linked together. When we breed these two plants together RrYy X RrYy what are the gamete combinations that CAN NOT OCCUR? A) Ry and rY B) Ry and RY C) rY and rY D) Ry and Ry E) All of them could occur
18. The observation that different geographical areas sometimes exhibit plant and animal communities of similar appearance, even though the individual plants and animals are not closely related, is called (A) adaptation (B) homology (C) the fossil record (D) convergent evolution (E) divergent evolution.
19. The "scientific creationism" view includes all of the following beliefs except (A) the organisms did not change from their original appearance (B) all species of organisms were individually created (C) the earth is much younger than most scientists believe (D) biblical account of the origin of the earth is literally true (E) extinct species are replaced with new ones.
20. A piece of wood contains 18 mg of the radioactive isotope carbon-14. The half-life of carbon-14 is 5,600 years. How many half-lives and years will it take before the carbon-14 decays to less than 4 mg? (A) 9 half-lives; 50,400 years (B) 2 half-lives; 11,200 years (C) 4 half-lives; 22,400 years (D) 1 half-lives; 5,600 years (E) 3 half-lives; 16,800 years.
21. The side toes of a horse, the pelvis of the whale, and the human appendix are all examples of (A) vestigial structures (B) homeotic mutations (C) acquired structures (D) analogous structures (E) homologous structures.
22. Which of the following is the best scientific reason that the origin of species according to creation science should not be included in the curriculum of biology courses? (A) It constitutes the teaching of religion (B) It is not a testable theory (C) It has proven to be false (D) It is contrary to the beliefs of most scientists (E) It has been superseded by more modern theories.
23. Some ribosomes are embedded into (A) chromosomes (B) histones (C) rough endoplasmic reticulum (D) smooth endoplasmic reticulum (E) vacuoles.
24. Mitochondria and chloroplasts are the other organelles besides the nucleus that contain (A) channels (B) DNA (C) pigments (D) plasma membranes (E) pores.
25. A cell biologist treats a cell so that oxygen cannot diffuse across the membrane. Which organelle will be directly affected? (A) mitochondria (B) nucleus (C) ribosome (D) lysosomes (E) Golgi apparatus.
26. Plants, fungi, and bacteria share which one of the following characteristics? (A) vesicles (B) nuclei (C) nuclear membranes (D) lysosomes (E) cell walls.
27. A diploid organism that has two identical alleles for the same trait is called _______ for that particular trait. (A) codominant (B) heterozygous (C) recessive (D) homozygous (E) dominant.
28. Mendel's understanding of the inheritance of traits in peas, expressed in modern language, included all of the following except (A) each individual contains two genes for each trait (B) parents transmit information encoded in genes (C) each of the alleles present in an individual is discrete (D) if a given allele is present, its effects will be seen in the individual (E) not all genes are identical; alternative forms (alleles) exist.
29. When the two haploid gametes contain two different alleles of a given gene, the resulting offspring is called (A) heterozygous (B) a fused allele (C) a haploid (D) homozygous (E) discrete.
30. In a heterozygous individual the allele being expressed is (A) masked (B) redundant (C) epistatic (D) dominant (E) recessive.
31. Let P = purple flowers and p = white, and T = tall plants and t = dwarf. What combinations of gametes could be produced by a heterozygote for both the traits? (A) infertile, no gametes produced (B) PpTt only (C) Pp, Tt (D) PT, Pt, pT, pt (E) P, p, T, t.
33. One of the main reasons genes assort independent of one another is that (A) they produce unrelated traits (B) they are different alleles (C) they are on different chromosomes (D) they produce related traits (E) they are on the same chromosome.
34. When Mendel crossed dark purple-flowered pea plants with white-flowered pea plants, he never got any pea plants with light purple flowers. This was counter to the (A) theory of blending inheritance (B) idea of acquired characteristic inheritance (C) the laws of probability (D) the assumption of direct transmission of traits (E) the law of dominance.
35. Height and eye colors are two examples of continuous variation in humans. Whereas in pea plants the tall allele is dominant over the short allele, there are no intermediate heights in peas. Which of the following is the best explanation for the differences described above? (A) The intermediate size pea plant seeds are aborted within the seedpod and thus will never develop. (B) The intermediate size pea plant seeds have deleterious alleles that prevent them from germinating. (C) These variations in humans are affected by lack of dominance in the alleles that control these traits. (D) Humans are more advanced than pea plants; thus, the genetics of peas is much simpler than humans. (E) Many genes, rather than one gene for a characteristic, control some variations in species.
36. Let Y = yellow and y = green, and R = round and r = wrinkled. You cross YYRR peas with yyrr peas. All of the F1 individuals are yellow and round with a genotype of YyRr. You then perform a F2 cross and get the expected 9:3:3:1 phenotypic ratio. Which of the following is the correct genotypic ratio for yellow, round F2 individuals? (A) 1/16 YYRR, 2/16 YYRr, 2/16 YyRR, 4/16 YyRr (B) 1/16 YyRr, 2/16 YYRr, 2/16 YyRR, 4/16 YYRR (C) 1/16 YYRR, 1/16 YYRr, 1/16 YyRR (D) 1/16 YYRr, 2/16 YYRR, 2/16 YyRR, 4/16 YyRr (E) none of the above.
37. The cell produced by the fusion of an egg and a sperm is the (A) gamete (B) germ line cell (C) haploid (D) somatic cell (E) zygote.
38. Down Syndrome is due to chromosome (A) translocation (B) aneuploidy (C) transposons
(D) inversion (E) polyploidy
39. How does DNA control the cell (A) By controlling lipid synthesis. (B) By controlling mutation.
(C) By controlling carbohydrate metabolism. (D) By controlling protein synthesis (E) By none of the above.
40. Livestock owners and breeders have most likely maximized their abilities to greatly improve size and speed of the animals that they raise. This is a consequence of (A) existing genetic combinations have been nearly exhausted as well as the limited amount of genetic variability that existed to begin with (B) using artificial insemination instead of allowing animals to breed on their own (C) too many crossing over events in previous livestock generations (D) not enough crossing over events in previous livestock generations (E) none of the above.
41. Which of the following is not a component of nucleic acids? (A) organic nitrogen bases (B) protein (C) phosphate (D) sugar (E) both B & D.
42. Both DNA and RNA are made up of building blocks known as (A) nucleotides (B) amino acids (C) complementary base pairs (D) genes (E) fatty acids.
43. Amino acids are transported to the ribosome for use in building the polypeptide by (A) mRNA molecules (B) rRNA molecules (C) tRNA molecules (D) DNA ligase molecules (E) DNA polymerase molecules.
44. Similar to the complementary purine-pyrimidine relationship observed in DNA, which of the following choices pairs with adenine in RNA? (A) guanine (B) uracil (C) thymine (D) cytosine.
45. Protein synthesis takes place on (A) the plasma membrane (B) lysosomes (C) microbodies (D) ribosomes (E) the nucleus.
46. The transfer of information from DNA to mRNA is referred to as (A) transformation (B) transference (C) translation (D) transcription (E) translocation.
47. If the sequence of bases in a section of DNA is ATCGCTCC, what is the corresponding sequence of bases in mRNA? (A) UAGCGAGG (B) AUCCGAUU (C) TATCGGCC (D) TAGGCUGG (E) ATCCGATT.
48. Given the sentence "THE FAT CAT ATE THE RED RAT," which of the following would represent a frameshift mutation? (A) THE FAT CAT ATE THE RED RAT (B) THE CAT ATE THE RED RAT (C) THE FAT RAT ATE THE RED RAT (D) THE FAC ATA TET HER EDR AT.
49. Suppose I want to estimate the length of time that two species have been separated via evolution. All but one of these is correct. (A) It is best to compare pieces of DNA coding for a functional enzyme that is present in both species (e.g. cytochrome oxidase). (B) It is best to compare pieces of DNA coding for a structural enzyme that is present in both species (e.g. hemoglobin). (C) It is best to compare non-coding regions of DNA. (D) It is best to focus on one segment of DNA rather than several. (E) All are correct.
50. What is the best description of epigenetics? (A) Adding methyl groups (--CH3) to cytosine can be inherited and this can cause gene inactivation. (B) It is the subject of study of Punnett and Morgan in the early days of genetics after Mendel’s work had been discovered. (C) It is best exemplified by the reversal of polyploidy to diploploidy in the speciation process. (D) Explains crossover of the sry gene in sex reversal. (E) Activation of silent mutations.
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