BIOLOGY 110 Study Guide

Unit 1: Characteristics of life, scientific method, evolution,

basic chemistry, cell structure.
1. What are the characteristics of life?
2. What is the fundamental unit of life?
3. What are the steps of the scientific method?
4. Know the definitions for the following terms: theory, hypothesis, experimental group, control
group, dependent variable, and experimental variable.
5. What is the difference between a theory and a hypothesis?
6. Define: adaptation, natural selection, evolution, fitness and mutation.
7. What is the difference between adaptation and acclimation?
8. Can an individual adapt or evolve?
9. How does an animal increases its fitness?
10. What are the three conditions needed for natural selection to occur?
11. What is the founder effect?
12. What is a genetic bottleneck?
13. Define: matter, element, atom, atomic number, atomic weight, and isotope.
14. What are the particles of an item, and what are their charges?
15. What are the three forms of bonding and how do they differ?
16. What properties of water are dependent on hydrogen bonding?
17. What is the definition of an organic molecule?
18. What are the biological functions of the following organic molecules?
a. proteins
b. carbohydrates
c. lipids
d. nucleic acids
19. What are the monomers of the following organic molecules?
a. proteins

b. carbohydrates
c. lipids
d. nucleic acids
20. Which cellular organelles contain DNA?
21. What are the functions of the following organelles?
a. mitochondria
b. endoplasmic reticulum
c. golgi
d. chloroplast
e. nucleus
f. ribosome
22. What are the differences between prokaryotes and eukaryotes?
23. What is the endosymbiont hypothesis?
24. What is the difference between meiosis and mitosis?
25. Define homozygote and heterozygote.

Unit 2: Energy, Digestion, Respiration and Photosynthesis

1. Define energy?
2. What are the two forms of energy?
3. What type of energy is stored in chemical bonds?
4. What is the first law of thermodynamics?
5. What is the second law of thermodynamics?
6. What are the major reactions of aerobic cellular respiration, and in what order do they occur?
7. Where in the cell do the major reactions of aerobic cellular respiration occur?
8. What is the final electron acceptor in aerobic cellular respiration?
9. How much ATP and energy are produced by glycolysis, fermentation, and aerobic cellular
respiration?
10. What are enzymes, how do they perform their function?
11. What factors can affect the speed of a chemical reaction?
12. How is ATP used to power cellular work?

13. What are the main phases of photosynthesis?

14. How many molecules of CO2 are needed to produce one molecule of glucose in
photosynthesis?
15. When electrons are excited and leave a chlorophyll molecule how're they replaced?
16. Where does the Calvin cycle occur?
17. What are the phases of the digestive process, and where do they occur?
18. Where does the majority of nutrient absorption take place?
19. Which nutrients can human body used to provide energy?
20. Which digestive enzymes digest proteins?

Unit 3: Animal behavior, nervous system, and endocrine

system.
1. Which two organ systems are most involved in producing changes leading to behavior patterns?
2. What is adaptive behavior?
3. What is learned behavior?
4. What is innate behavior?
5. What forms of communication do animals use?
6. How is a signal transmitted along an axon?
7. How does the nerve impulse cross the synaptic cleft?
8. Which is faster, nervous system signaling or endocrine system communication?
9. Which has a longer duration of response, nervous system signaling or endocrine system
communication?
10. What types of stimuli do the nervous system and endocrine system respond to?
11. What is the major difference between peptide and steroid hormones?
12. What is the function of insulin?

Unit 4: Classification

1. What are the differences between prokaryotes, archaea and eukaryotes?

2. Which characteristics are shared between green algae and plants?
3. What is the sequence of the life cycle of alternation of generations?
4. Arrange the plant groups in order from the oldest to the most recently evolved.
5. Which plants lack vascular tissue?
6. What is the difference between gymnosperms and angiosperms?
7. Arrange the invertebrate groups in order from oldest to the most recently evolved.
8. Arrange the vertebrate groups in order from oldest to the most recently evolved.
9. What is the difference between radial and bilateral symmetry?
10. What are the distinguishing features of primates?
11. Arrange the hominids in order from oldest to the most recently evolved.

Unit 5: Ecology
1. What shape is the human growth curve (for the world population)?
2. What percentage of energy in a trophic level can be transferred as useable energy to the next
higher level?
3. What is mutualism?
4. What is coevolution?
5. What is the ultimate energy source for most life on earth?
6. Which kind of organism would be most likely to perform photosynthesis?
7. Which biomes have the most nutrient rich soils?
8. How does nitrogen from the air enter plants and animals?
9. What factor is the most influential in determining the distribution of terrestrial biomes?