The first telescopes, and most amateur telescopes, rely on the human eye to observe
objects. Modern telescopes record the observations with ________.
A) projection systems
B) digital cameras
C) photographic film
D) polyspectral scanners
Which of these instruments is not used to measure air pressure?
A) mercurial barometer
B) aneroid barometer
C) barograph
D) anemometer
Any variance in the orbit of a planet from its predicted path is referred to as ________.
A) Ptolemaic motion
B) occultation
C) precession
D) perturbation
E) retrograde motion
P waves ________.
A) propagate only in solids
B) are faster than S waves and surface waves
C) have higher amplitudes than do S waves
D) produce the strongest ground shaking
The era known as the “age of mammals” is the ________ era.
A) Precambrian
B) Paleozoic
C) Mesozoic
D) Cenozoic
________ are found both on Mars and Earth.
A) Erosional features related to flowing water
B) Active volcanoes
C) Heavily cratered landscapes preserved from early in the planets’ histories
D) Oceans
The classification of air as stable or unstable is based on ________.
A) temperature
B) motion
C) humidity
D) state
Which of the following is the most useful measure of water vapor in the air?
A) dew point
B) mixing ratio
C) temperature
D) relative humidity
E) air pressure
Climate change and human activity like overgrazing of grasslands is leading to large
areas subject to “desertification” where native grass cover dies out during drought
periods, exposing soil to erosion. What is potentially the greatest initial soil erosion
potential during this type of an event?
A) loss of topsoil by wind erosion on a large scale
B) local gullying produced by intermittent rain storms
C) sand blown in from adjacent deserts
D) growth of shrubs shading the ground, further killing the grasses
Which of the following best describes how geysers erupt?
A) Water suddenly boils in disconnected voids and cracks above the water table,
causing the aquifer to explosively fragment.
B) Water slowly boils in a network of vertical cracks above the water table, sending up
a plume of steam and hot water.
C) Water below the water table slowly boils in a vertical crack or natural conduit,
causing a plume of condensed water vapor to rise above the vent.
D) With a slight reduction in pressure, water in a saturated, natural conduit suddenly
boils, sending a plume of steam and hot water into the air above the vent.
Sailors in the 16th-18th century dreaded “rounding the horn” because of strong winds
and heavy seas. Cape Horn is about latitude 55S at the tip of South America. These
sailors considered this a passage from the Atlantic to Pacific oceans, but this ocean is
now often called ________.
A) the Southern Ocean
B) the Antarctic Ocean
C) the Australian Ocean
D) the Indian Ocean
What of the following is considered to be the most likely cause of the Quaternary Ice
ages?
A) human activity releasing “greenhouse” gases
B) plate tectonics moving continents to polar regions
C) variations in the earth’s orbit
D) variations in the Sun’s intensity
A Santa Ana (or Chinook or Foehn) wind is a ________.
A) wind associated with a blizzard
B) cold, damp wind blowing off a snow field
C) wind that is common to the world’s deserts
D) very dry, warm wind flowing down a mountain slope
A thrust fault increases the thickness of the crust as it moves toward a continental
interior in a mountain belt; yet the crust beyond the mountain front stays the same
thickness. Isostasy would suggest that the area at the mountain front, where the thrust
emerges, should ________ over time.
A) uplift
B) stay the same
C) subside
D) near sea level
Hydrogen “burning” in stars is ________.
A) a chemical reaction that bonds hydrogen to oxygen to make water, which remains a
gas because of the extremely high temperatures
B) an atomic reaction that generates hydrogen by splitting helium atoms
C) an atomic reaction that fuses 4 protons to make a helium nucleus, releasing energy
by converting mass to energy
D) hydrogen atoms that combine with deuterium atoms to make HD complexes, and
this reaction generates immense amounts of energy.
Mount Pele on the island of Martinique killed thousands of people in ________.
A) a pyroclastic flow, also called a Nue Ardent
B) a caldera collapse
C) an ash fall that smothered the people living there
D) a cinder cone eruption
The Andes Mountains in South America are formed by ________.
A) subduction
B) sea floor spreading
C) back-arc contraction
D) continental collision
When two continents converge, ________.
A) the heavier continent is subducted
B) the lighter continent is subducted
C) the sediments trapped between them are pushed up and deformed to make a
mountain range
D) a volcanic arc forms on the upper plate
Polar regions receive nearly continuous sunlight in the summer months so why doesn’t
the mean temperature during those months get above 10C?
A) In the summer, the winds blow from the cold oceans and keep the temperatures low.
B) The sun is too low in the sky to be an effective heat source.
C) The sun’s energy has to heat the frozen atmosphere in order to reach the land and
that takes all summer.
D) The reflection of the sun’s energy (albedo) by the ice and snow prevents the area
from warming.
E) The ozone layer has thinned significantly over the polar regions and this prevents
heat from being trapped near the surface in those areas.
During the ________ era, the westward-moving North American plate began to
override the Pacific plate, eventually causing the tectonic activity that ultimately
formed the mountains of western North America.
A) Precambrian
B) Paleozoic
C) Mesozoic
D) Cenozoic
E) none of the above
Carefully examine the telescopic view of the lunar surface (near side) below and the
features labeled A, B, and C.
(a) Give a brief description that characterizes the bright area around C.
(b) Notice the features like those labeled A. What are such features called?
(c) How are craters like the one labeled B different from the craters of the area labeled
C?
(d) In what order (from first to latest) did the features form that are labeled A, B, and C?
Which of the following gases is an efficient absorber of the earth’s emitted energy?
A) oxygen
B) carbon dioxide
C) argon
D) nitrogen
E) none of the above
Clay minerals formed from gabbro or diorite bedrock illustrate which kind of
weathering?
A) chemical
B) proactive
C) syntropical
D) mechanical
The part of the Sun clearly visible during a solar eclipse is ________.
A) the photosphere
B) the chromospheres
C) the mesosphere
D) the corona
The normal lapse rate in the troposphere is about ________ per kilometer.
A) 3.5oC
B) 6.5oC
C) 1.5oC
D) 9.5oC
Which one of the fogs listed below may be categorized as an evaporation fog?
A) advection
B) radiation
C) steam
D) upslope
The wavelength of light emitted from a distance object is related to ________.
A) the energy of the sourcemore energetic source has higher wavelength emissions
B) the energy of the sourcemore energetic source has lower wavelength emissions
C) distance of the sourcethe farther away the object is, the lower the wavelength
observed related to changes in electromagnetic energy over time
D) gravitygravity bends electromagnetic waves causing refraction and sorting of
wavelengths
Which of the following is not something that happens to incoming radiation?
A) heated
B) reflected
C) absorbed
D) transmitted
A flat, bench-like surface cut in rock along a coast is a ________.
A) sea stack
B) tombolo
C) wave-cut platform
D) spit
Much of the Gulf of Mexico is underlain by large thicknesses of salt that formed in a
small ocean basin like the red sea, as the north Atlantic spreading began in Mesozoic
time. This salt is a good example of ________.
A) terrigenous sediment
B) biogenous sediment
C) hydrogenous sediment
D) both terrigenous and biogenous sediment
A steep pressure gradient ________.
A) would be depicted by widely spaced isobars
B) produces strong winds
C) is only possible in the tropics
D) produces light winds