Photoautotrophs
A) make sugar by using organic raw materials.
B) produce organic molecules from inorganic molecules.
C) eat other organisms that use light energy to make food molecules.
D) include only the green plants.
Which of the following serves as an impenetrable barrier that prevents more than one
sperm from fertilizing an egg?
A) the acrosome
B) the jelly coat of the egg
C) the sperm’s plasma membrane
D) the vitelline layer
Consider the following food label and then answer the questions that follow.
Krispy Krackers 100-Calorie Pouches
You are trying to cut down on the number of dessert foods that you eat as one effort
toward losing weight. You don’t feel ready to cut all sweets from your diet, so you
decide to buy a dessert snack item that comes in small packages (hoping that the
smaller amount will satisfy your cravings for sweet foods). In the grocery store, you
study the label above for 100-calorie pouches of Krispy Krackers.
What percentage of the daily value of fat-soluble vitamins is provided by this package
of cookies?
A) 0%
B) 2%
C) 3%
D) 4%
Which of the following diseases cannot currently be prevented by vaccination?
A) AIDS
B) polio
C) measles
D) tetanus
Home pregnancy test kits work by detecting the presence of a hormone in a woman’s
urine. Recently developed test kits include an indicator of how long the women has
been pregnant (1-2, 2-3, or 3+ weeks). The presence of ________ would indicate that a
woman is pregnant, and ________ levels of this hormone would indicate that she is
farther along in her pregnancy.
A) HCG; low
B) HCG; high
C) FSH; low
D) FSH; high
During the Carboniferous period, photosynthesis in immense swamp forests removed
________ from the atmosphere, which produced a drier, cooler global climate and
promoted the success of ________.
A) oxygen; ferns
B) oxygen; seed plants
C) carbon dioxide; lycophytes
D) carbon dioxide; seed plants
If you inflate a balloon and then let it go, the air rushing out moves the balloon in a way
that is similar to the way that a ________ moves.
A) snake
B) kangaroo
C) squid
D) shark
You’re the manager of a factory that produces enzyme-washed blue jeans (the enzymes
lighten the color of the denim, giving a “faded” appearance). When the most recent
batch of fabric came out of the enzyme wash, however, the color wasn’t light enough to
meet your standards. Your quality control laboratory wants to do some tests to
determine why the wash enzymes didn’t perform as expected.
Based on your understanding of enzyme structure, which of the following would you
recommend that they also investigate?
A) the temperature of the liquid in the washing vat
B) the manufacturer of the fabric
C) how long the fabric has been in storage
D) the primary structure of the enzyme
After reading the paragraph below, answer the questions that follow.
Four decades after the end of the Vietnam War, the remains of an Air Force pilot were
discovered and returned to the United States. A search of Air Force records identified
three families to which the remains might possibly belong. Each family had a surviving
twin of a missing service member. The following STR profiles were obtained from the
remains of the pilot and the surviving twins from the three families.
Based on analysis of the STR sites shown, which family is the missing pilot least likely
to belong to?
A) family 1
B) family 2
C) family 3
D) Family 1 and family 2 are equally unlikely.
Which plant in Went’s experiment shows auxin stimulating elongation in the left side of
the plant only?
A) plant A
B) plant B
C) plant C
D) plant D
A technique called flow cytometry is used by scientists and researchers to count or sort
cells based on specific properties. By labeling cellular DNA with a fluorescent dye,
flow cytometry can sort cells based on the amount of DNA present, thereby making it
possible to distinguish between cells that are in different stages of the cell cycle. Flow
cytometry is especially useful to the medical community because it can help with the
diagnosis of certain types of cancers.
Below is a typical set of data that you might obtain when running a flow cytometry
experiment using a sample of healthy skin cells. Use this figure to help you answer the
following questions.
Which peak represents cells that contain the most DNA?
A) A
B) B
C) C
D) It cannot be determined from this figure.
Which step in the creation of cDNA involves the use of reverse transcriptase?
A) step 1
B) step 2
C) step 3
D) step 4
Lactose intolerance
A) is common in people of all ages, from infancy to adulthood.
B) is most common in people of European descent.
C) can currently be treated by gene therapy to treat the underlying cause.
D) does not affect the consumption of beverages made from soy or rice.
What is the role of the fungus in a mycorrhizalassociation?
A) contributes to photosynthesis
B) absorption of water, phosphate, and other minerals
C) secretion of growth factors
D) release of water
Melanoma (skin cancer) can develop after several mutations occur in skin cells. If a
woman is diagnosed with melanoma and becomes pregnant, what are the chances that
her offspring will inherit melanoma?
A) The offspring will certainly be born with melanoma.
B) There is a chance, but it depends on how serious the mother’s melanoma is.
C) There is a chance, but it depends on whether or not the father has melanoma.
D) It is unlikely that the offspring will be born with melanoma.
A number of studies have found that for many plants there is an increase in seed
production under conditions of elevated carbon dioxide levels. Which of the following
is a likely explanation for this phenomenon?
A) The energy needed to produce seeds comes from carbon dioxide.
B) The carbon needed to produce new plant molecules through photosynthesis requires
carbon dioxide.
C) Increased carbon dioxide levels cause increased cell respiration, which is needed to
produce more seeds.
D) Increased carbon dioxide causes increased plant heating, which speeds up seed
production.
Membrane phospholipids
A) have hydrophobic heads that face the center of the membrane and are shielded from
water.
B) have hydrophilic tails that face outward and are exposed to water.
C) are able to drift about in the plasma membrane.
D) remain fluid because they are tightly packed against one another.
Which of the following exhibits bilateral symmetry?
A) a butterfly
B) a sponge
C) a sea anemone
D) a pair of hands
The hair cells in the utricle detect
A) subsonic sound vibrations.
B) rotation of the head in an anteroposterior plane (a plane that cuts through you from
front to back).
C) rotation of the head in a coronal plane (a plane that cuts through you from side to
side).
D) the position of the head with respect to gravity.
Which of the following is an example of agonistic behavior?
A) A dog raises its hackles, bares its teeth, and stands tall to appear threatening.
B) A honeybee does a waggle dance to indicate the direction of food.
C) A male ruffed grouse spreads its tail and beats its wings to attract a female.
D) Ants mark their trails by releasing pheromones.
________ marks the end of a gene and causes transcription to stop.
A) A stop codon
B) RNA ligase
C) A terminator
D) Methionine
Which of the following is a carboxyl group?
A) -C-O
B) -OH
C) -NH2
D) -COOH
Some current research efforts are investigating whether or not ________, a group of
prokaryotes with the ability to produce oxygen as a by-product of photosynthesis, can
be used as a source of renewable energy by converting sunlight into electricity.
A) chlamydias
B) spirochetes
C) proteobacteria
D) cyanobacteria
The functioning of an electron transport chain is analogous to
A) a Slinky toy going down a flight of stairs.
B) a canoe going over a waterfall.
C) a person climbing a flight of stairs one step at a time.
D) a person leaping from the top to the bottom of a flight of stairs in one jump.
Which type of epithelial tissue shown is a stratified tissue?
A) tissue A
B) tissue B
C) tissue C
D) tissue D
Eukaryotic cells spend most of their cell cycle in which phase?
A) interphase
B) prophase
C) metaphase
D) telophase
Eutrophication of a lake could occur if
A) phosphate-rich detergents were dumped into the lake.
B) fertilizers were applied in an insoluble form.
C) runoff from overfertilized lawns was prevented from reaching the lake.
D) fish were removed.
Which of the following substances would have the most trouble crossing a biological
membrane by diffusing through the lipid bilayer?
A) O2
B) CO2
C) Na+
D) a small, nonpolar molecule such as butane (C4H10)
On a trip to the Southwest, you and a friend collect some seeds from a pion, which is a
type of pine tree. Your friend also gathers a small bagful of soil from under the pion
tree. Back home, both of you plant your seeds in commercial sterilized potting soil, but
your friend adds a spoonful of the collected dirt to each of her pots. Her seedlings do
better than yours. Which of the following is the likeliest explanation?
A) Pine seedlings are better adapted to the sandy soil of the Southwest than to
commercial potting mix.
B) The soil from the Southwest probably contained macronutrients missing from the
potting mix.
C) The soil from the Southwest probably contained nitrogen-fixing bacteria that
colonized the seedlings’ root nodules.
D) The soil from the Southwest probably contained fungi able to establish a
mycorrhizal association with the seedlings’ roots.
You are practicing throwing baseballs long distances with the members of your baseball
team. At the same time that your partner throws the ball to you, another player across
from you throws his baseball off-target, and it heads straight toward you. You hold your
baseball glove up to catch your partner’s ball, and you instinctively throw up your other
arm to protect your face from the other incoming ball. The protective action of throwing
up your arm is an example of a(n)
A) nerve net.
B) reflex.
C) effector cell.
D) blood-brain barrier.