1. Slime molds reproduce
A) asexually.
B) both asexually and sexually.
C) by budding.
D) using binary fission.
E) vegetatively.
2. An organism that obtains its energy from chemicals is a
A) autotroph
B) chemotroph
C) heterotrophy
D) phototroph
E) autotroph and chemotroph
3. The Irish potato famine was caused by an organism that belongs to which group?
A) ciliates
B) diatoms
C) dinoflagellates
D) oomycetes
E) prokaryotes
4. Which of the following is true of the Pterophytes?
A) Includes the ferns and are seedless plants.
B) They have flagellated sperm but no roots.
C) They have roots, a sporophyte-dominant life cycle, and the sporophyte is dependent on the gametophyte.
D) They have vascular tissues and seeds.
E) They possess fronds, rhizomes, and seeds.
5. Not present in all bacteria, this cell covering enables cells that possess it to resist the defenses of host organisms
A) cell wall
B) capsule
C) endospore
D) flagellum
E) sex pilus
6. Which of these would, if acted upon a gene, prevent this gene from acting as a reliable molecular clock?
A) Genetic drift
B) Most substitutions involving the third codon position
C) Mutations within introns
D) Natural selection
E) Neutral mutations
7. Which of the following is composed almost entirely of peptidoglycan in a gram-positive prokaryotic cell?
A) Cell wall
B) Cuticle
C) Endospore
D) Flagellum
E) Sex pilus
8. Which of the following traits do archaeans and bacteria share?
A) Composition of the cell wall
B) Composition of the cell wall and lack of a nuclear envelope
C) Identical rRNA sequences and presence of membrane-bound organelles
D) Lack of a nuclear envelope and lack of membrane-bound organelles
E) Presence of a nuclear envelope
9. The legless condition of all snakes and some lizards is the result of
A) Individual Lizards adapting to a fossorial (living in underground burrows) lifestyle.
B) Lizards are more evolutionarily advanced than snakes, but some have not grown legs yet.
C) Several instances of the legless condition arising independently of each other.
D) Their common ancestor was legless.
10. An organism is collected from the ocean. It has differentiated organs, cell walls of cellulose, and chloroplasts. The organism could be a brown, red, or green algae, a charophyte washed into the ocean from a freshwater source or a land plant washed into the ocean. The presence of which of the following features would definitively identify the organism as a land plant?
A) Alternation of generations
B) Embryos
C) Flagellated sperm
D) Rosette cellulose-synthesizing complexes
E) Sporopollenin
11. The four chambered heart of birds and the four-chambered heart of mammals evolved independently of each other. The basal ancestor of the mammals is usually referred to as the mammal-like reptiles. Birds are much more recent evolutionarily and the crocodilians are the living sister group to birds. Birds are a branch of the dinosaurs. The closest common ancestor of mammals and birds may be turtles (three-chambered heart). If one were unaware of the independent evolutionary relationship between mammal and bird hearts, then one might logically conclude that:
A) birds and mammals are more distantly related than is actually the case
B) birds and mammals should be placed in the same family
C) early mammals possessed feathers
D) the birds were the first to evolve the four-chambered heart
E) the common ancestor of birds and mammals had a four-chambered heart
12. The common ancestors of birds and mammals were very early reptiles, which possessed three-chambered hearts. (See question 11.) Birds and mammals are alike in having four-chambered hearts. The four-chambered heart of birds and mammals is best described as
A) homoplasy (similarity in taxon of different ancestry which is the result of convergent evolution)
B) structural homology
C) the result of shared ancestry
D) the result of similar mutations causing genomes to converge
E) vestigial organs
13. A phylogenetic tree constructed from gene sequence data is based on similarities in
A) biochemical pathways.
B) ecological and habitat similarities.
C) morphology.
D) nucleotide substitutions in homologous genes
E) patterns of embryological development.
14. What are the definitions of seed and stomata, respectively?
A) A mature ovary of a flower that protects seeds and often aids in their dispersal; A multicellular organ found only in plants in which meiosis occurs and haploid cells develop.
B) An adaptation in some terrestrial plants consisting of an embryo packaged along with a store of food within a protective coat; A microscopic pore, primarily in leaves, that is used for gas exchange, with guard cells which are responsible for regulating the size of the opening and to some extent the loss of water.
C) An adaptation in some terrestrial plants consisting of an embryo packaged along with a store of food within a protective coat; Waxy covering of leaves and other plant organs that minimizes water loss and reduces pathogen entry.
D) Waxy covering of leaves and other plant organs that minimizes water loss and reduces pathogen entry; A mature ovary of a flower that protects seeds and often aids in their dispersal.
E) Waxy covering of leaves and other plant organs that minimizes water loss and reduces pathogen entry; A multicellular organ found only in plants in which meiosis occurs and haploid cells develop.
15. Angiosperms are the most successful terrestrial plants. Which of these features is unique to them and helps account for their success?
A) dominant gametophytes
B) embryos enclosed within seed coats
C) fruits enclosing seeds
D) sperm cells without flagella
E) wind pollination
16. Which of the following makes seeds such an important evolutionary innovation?
A) Seed coat and supplemental food allow for survival under very stressful conditions and formation of a seed bank; Compared to spores, seeds can transported long distances.
B) Seeds can be produced in much larger numbers than spores; Seed coat and supplemental food allow for survival under very stressful conditions and formation of a seed bank.
C) Seeds can be produced in much larger numbers than spores; Seed coat and supplemental food allow for survival under very stressful conditions and formation of a seed bank; and seeds eliminate the need for flagellated sperm.
D) Seeds can be produced in much larger numbers than spores; Seed coat and supplemental food allow for survival under very stressful conditions and formation of a seed bank; and Compared to spores, seeds can transported long distances.
17. The gene for sex pilus construction and the gene for tetracycline resistance are located together on the same plasmid within a particular bacterium. If this bacterium readily performs conjugation then the result should be
A) The spread of the tetracycline resistance to many species of bacteria if the antibiotic tetracycline is being used.
B) The spread of the tetracycline resistance to many species of bacteria regardless of whether the antibiotic tetracycline is being used.
C) The spread of the tetracycline resistance among individuals of same species of bacteria if the antibiotic tetracycline is being used.
D) The spread of the tetracycline resistance among individuals of the same species of bacteria regardless of whether the antibiotic tetracycline is being used.
E) None of the above is correct. The answer depends on whether the plasmid is wild type or mutant.
18. Organisms classed as Euglenozoa have previously been classified as protozoans, protista, plants, and animals. Why the confusion?
A) The Euglenozoa are unicellular like protozoans, heterotrophic like animals, and photosynthetic like plants.
B) The Euglenozoa have cell structures that share some characteristics with eukaryotes and some with prokaryotes.
C) The Euglenozoa have cell walls like animals and multiple copies of their DNA like fungi.
D) The Euglenozoa have genes that are very similar to animals but morphology similar to plants.
19. If a fern gametophyte has both male and female gametes (hermaphroditic), then it
A) belongs to a species that is homosporous.
B) has lost the need for a sporophyte generation.
C) is actually not a fern because fern gametophytes are always either male or female.
D) must be diploid.
20. The chloroplasts of land plants are thought to have been derived according to which evolutionary sequence?
A) cyanobacteria → green algae → fungi →land plants
B) cyanobacteria → green algae → land plants
C) cyanobacteria → green algae → red algae → land plants
D) red algae → brown algae → green algae → land plants
E) red algae → cyanobacteria → land plants
21. Which of the following statements concerning living phytoplanktonic organisms is true?
A) They are important in maintaining oxygen in the Earth's seas and atmosphere, they can be so concentrated that they affect the color of seawater, and they are often found growing in the sediments of seas and oceans.
B) They are important members of ecological communities surrounding deep-sea hydrothermal vents and they are most often found growing in the sediments of seas and oceans.
C) They are important members of ecological communities surrounding deep-sea hydrothermal vents, they are most often found growing in the sediments of seas and oceans, and they are important primary producers in most aquatic food webs.
D) They are important primary producers in most aquatic food webs, they are important in maintaining oxygen in the Earth's seas and atmosphere, and they can be so concentrated that they affect the color of seawater.
E) They are most often found growing in the sediments of seas and oceans, they are important primary producers in most aquatic food webs, and they are important in maintaining oxygen in the Earth's seas and atmosphere.
22. Which of the following are responsible for many human diseases?
A) chemoautotrphs
B) chemohetertrophs that perform decomposition
C) parasitic chemoheterotrophs
D) photoautotrophs
E) photoheterotrophs
23. What are phylogenies useful for?
A) Interpreting evolutionary relationships between extant and extinct organisms including the ancestors of humans, aiding the legal protection and conservation of species, and determining convergent evolution from homology.
B) Identifying sources of new genes for improving food production and sources of medicinal compounds, tracing the evolution of a ‘strain' of a disease in order to discover genes responsible for changes in virulence, and aiding the legal protection and conservation of species.
C) Determining allopatric from sympatric speciation, determining convergent evolution from homology, and determining paternity.
D) A and B are true.
E) B and C are true
24. Which is true of Eukarya?
A) They have circular chromosomes and membrane-bound organelles.
B) They have circular chromosomes, membrane-bound organelles, and a nuclear envelope.
C) They have introns and circular chromosomes.
D) They have introns and a nuclear envelope.
E) They have introns and operons.
25. Bryophytes never formed forests (mats, yes, but not forests) because
A) not all are heterosporous
B) the sporophyte is too weak
C) they have no adaptations to prevent desiccation
D) they lack lignified vascular tissue
E) they possess flagellated sperms
26. In life cycles with an alternation of generations, multicellular haploid forms alternate with
A) multicellular diploid forms
B) multicellular haploid forms
C) multicellular polyploidy forms
D) unicellular diploid forms
E) unicellular haploid forms
27. What adaptation do terrestrial plants have for protection from predators?
A) Cuticle
B) Guard cells
C) Guard dogs
D) Secondary compounds
E) Seeds
28. Which statement about the domain Archaea is false?
A) Genetic studies have recently revealed many previously unknown species.
B) Genetic studies have revealed that archaean genomes are unique with very few genes similar to those in eukaryotes.
B) Some archaeans are adapted to live in waters above the boiling point.
C) Some archaeans can inhabit solutions that are nearly 30% salt.
E) Some archaeans can reduce CO2 to methane.
29. Seed plants evolved around
A) 25 million years ago
B) 305 million years ago
C) 490 million years ago
D) 600 million years ago
E) 4 billion years ago
30. According to the endosymbiotic theory of the origin of eukaryotic cells, how did mitochondria and some other organelles originate?
A) Gene duplication allowed for ‘extra' genes to be freed from their original purpose and mutate into organelles.
B) Magic
C) Mitochondria and other organelles were engulfed, originally free-living prokaryotes.
D) Syngamy
E) We don't know.
31. On the island of Guam, large bats called ‘flying foxes' commonly feed on cycad seeds, a potent source of neurotoxins. The flying foxes do not visit male cones. Consequently, what should be true?
A) Flying foxes are very sensitive to the effects of the neurotoxin in the seeds, which is why they visit only the female cones.
B) Flying foxes may be dispersers of cycad seeds if the seeds are sometimes swallowed whole without being chewed.
C) The bite of the flying fox is deadly to humans.
D) The Flying foxes assist beetles as important pollinating agents of the cycads.
32. Mitochondria are thought to be the descendants of certain alpha-proteobacteria. They are, however, no longer able to live independently of the host cell, because most genes originally present on their chromosome have moved to the nuclear genome of the host. This movement of genes across species is called?
A) alternative gene splicing
B) binary fission
C) horizontal gene transfer
D) meiosis
E) plasmolysis
33. Embryophytes
A) have aggressive embryos that fight (phyte) other plants for sunlight
B) have embryos that are dependent on the parent plant
C) have embryos that are independent of the parent plant
D) have embryos that parasitize other plants (e.g., mistletoe)
34. Which of the following can be found in gymnosperms?
A) Fruits and naked seeds.
B) Pollen and leaves that are modified into a needle-like shape adapted to arid conditions because the water in the soil is often frozen and unavailable.
C) Seeds and pollen in a single cone and leaves that are modified into a needle-like shape adapted to arid conditions because the water in the soil is often frozen and unavailable.
D) Seeds and pollen in a single cone and naked seeds.
E) Triploid (3n) endosperm, naked seeds, and fruits.
35. During glacial periods, land plants evolve by increasing their number of stomata per unit surface area. This adaptation is probably
A) to balance the loss of chloroplasts due to lower temperatures
B) to decrease absorption of increasing levels of CO2
C) to increase absorption of decreasing levels of CO2
D) to increase the loss of water because the plant can easily get it from all the glaciers
36. The following table shows percent similarity, to humans, of nucleotide sequences from a homologous gene in five different species. What conclusion can be drawn from these data?
Species Percent Similarity
Chimpanzee 99.7
Orangutan 98.6
Baboon 97.2
Rhesus Monkey 96.9
Rabbit 93.7
A) All the species listed are mammals.
B) Among the organisms listed, humans shared an ancestor most recently with chimpanzees.
C) Humans and other primates evolved from rabbits around 10 million years ago.
D) Humans evolved from Chimpanzees somewhere in Africa about six million years ago.
E) Humans and chimpanzees have almost all the same genes.
37. Protists are all alike in that all are
A) autotrophic
B) eukaryotic
C) symbiotic
D) unicellular
38. Plasmodium falciparum is the parasite that causes malaria in humans and is responsible for about two million deaths each year. Researchers studied ten genes in P. falciparum, comparing an older genotype with weak virulence with a very recent strain that is particularly virulent. They found that silent substitutions (those that do not change the amino acid coded for) averaged about four percent across all ten genes and varied from 1-7% among the genes. Non-silent mutations averaged 3.1% but ranged from 0.0 for three genes to 23.0% for one gene. What would you look at to measure time since divergence and what would you examine to look for causes of the increased virulence?
A) Non-silent mutations in all genes for both estimates of divergence times and for causes of increased virulence.
B) Non-silent mutations in all genes for estimates of divergence times; the small number of rapidly evolving genes (those with lots of non-silent substitutions) for causes of increased virulence.
C) Silent mutations in all ten genes to estimate divergence time; Silent mutations in highly conserved genes (those with very few substitutions) to locate genes of interest for increased virulence.
D) Silent mutations in all ten genes to estimate divergence time; the small number of rapidly evolving genes (those with lots of non-silent substitutions) for causes of increased virulence.
E) Silent mutations in highly conserved genes (those with very few substitutions) to estimate divergence time; Non-silent mutations in all genes for causes of increased virulence.
39. What does mixotrophic mean?
A) An organism capable of both photosynthesis and heterotrophy.
B) An organism capable of undergoing both meiosis and mitosis.
C) An organism that obtains energy by using carbon dioxide to oxidize hydrogen.
D) An organism that obtains organic food molecules by eating other organisms or substances derived from them.
E) An organism that obtains organic food molecules without eating other organisms or substances derived from them.
40. The following characteristics all helped seedless plants become better adapted to land except
A) a dominant gametophyte
B) a waxy cuticle
C) stomata on leaves
D) vascular tissue
41. Which adaptation below provides protection from desiccation?
A) alternation of generations
B) cuticle
C) secondary compounds
D) tracheids and phloem
42. Which of these is true in the pine life cycle?
A) Cones are homologous to the capsules of moss plants.
B) Conifer pollen grains contain male gametophytes.
C) Double fertilization is relatively common.
D) Male and female gametophytes are in close proximity during gamete synthesis.
E) The pine tree is a gametophyte.
43. The generative cell of male angiosperm gametophytes is haploid. The cell divides to produce two haploid sperm cells. What type of cell division does the generative cell undergo to produce these sperm cells?
A) binary fission
B) meiosis
C) meiosis without subsequent cytokinesis
D) mitosis
44. Based on the figure below, what can be inferred about the relationship between African elephants (Loxodonta africana) and Asian elephants (Elephas maximus).
A) Asian and African elephants could never produce hybrid offspring because they are not even in the same genus, must less the same species.
B) The Asian elephant is actually more closely related to the woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) than to the African elephant, despite the fact that the woolly mammoth is extinct and the African elephant extant.
C) The Asian elephant is more closely related to the American mastodon (Mammut americanum) that is the African elephant.
D) They last shared a common ancestor 5.8-7.7 million years ago.
E) A and D are both true.
45. Which of the following pairs is the best example of homologous structures?
A) Australian marsupial mole and North American mole.
B) Bat wing and human hand.
C) Owl wing and wasp wing.
D) Porcupine quill and cactus spine.
46. Plant-like photosynthesis that releases O2 occurs in
A) actinomycetes
B) archaea
C) chemoautotrphic bacteria
D) chlamydias
E) cyanobacteria
47. Why can prokaryotes evolve so quickly relative to multicellular eukaryotes?
A) Extensive horizontal gene transfer via conjugation and prokaryotes have a shorter generation length.
B) Lack of introns allows greater genomic flexibility and prokaryotes have a shorter generation length
C) Lack of introns allows greater genomic flexibility, operons are more efficient at incorporating change, and the smaller prokaryotic genome allows more innovation.
D) Operons are more efficient at incorporating genetic change and the smaller prokaryotic genome allows for greater innovation.
E) Operons are more efficient at incorporating genetic change, prokaryotes have a shorter generation length, and the smaller prokaryotic genome allows for greater innovation.
48. Which of the following helps spread beneficial mutations through a population of prokaryotes?
A) binary fission
B) conjugation
C) meiosis
D) Both binary fission and conjugation
E) Both conjugation and meiosis.
49. Which of the following flower parts develops into the pulp of a fleshy fruit?
A) micropyle
B) ovary
C) ovule
D) stigma
E) style
50. If the chloroplasts of Chlorella are very similar to those found in the photosynthetic cells of land plants, then Chlorella is probably?
A) A brown algae
B) A diatom
C) A golden algae
D) A green algae
E) A red algae