Principles of Biology : Quiz 14 Study Guide


We will take Quiz 14, our last quiz,  on Wednesday, December 3. I recommend that you answer these questions yourself or with classmates. This not a graded assignment, nothing is to be turned in. These questions are just to help you prepare for this quiz.
Reading: The quiz will cover Chapter 14 and at least parts of Chapter 15. By the end of lecture on Monday, Dec. 1, we will know exactly how much of this will be covered on this quiz, the rest of which will be pushed onto the EOSQ (aka End Of the Semester Quiz, "EQ", or just "THE Quiz").

Note: The strikeout questions are moved to the EOSQ.

Questions to consider from Chapter 14:
1) What is transformation? How did Griffith discover this process with mice and bacteria?
2) What is a phage? What was the series of experiments, using phages, that showed the genetic material was DNA and not protein?
3) What is Chargaff's rule?
4) What is the structure of DNA? What is a nucleotide? What are its parts? How are nucleotides put together to form DNA?
5) How does the structure of DNA explain Chargaff's rule?
6) What is replication?
7) What is helicase?
8) What is DNA polymerase?
9) What is a "replication fork?"
10) What are some of the differences between prokaryotic and eukaryotic chromosomes? replication?
11) What is DNA proof reading? Who does this?
12) What is a "mutagen?"

from Chapter 15
13) In 1941 Beadle and Tatum made a breakthrough discovery with Neurospora crassa (Bread Mold). What was it?
14) Explain the Beadle and Tatum experiment. (See Figure 15.1 in text).
15) What is the "Central Dogma?" Explain.
16) Describe the characteristics of the genetic code.
17) Why is the genetic code called a "triplet code." What is a "reading frame?"
18) What does is mean to say that the code is "degenerate but specific?"
19) What is a "frame shift" mutation? How does it come about? (We didn't talk about this Monday, but it relates to reading frame.)
20) What is transcription?
21) What is mRNA? What is its function?
22) What is an exon? an intron?
23) What is the "spliceosome?" What is its function?
24) What is translation?
25) What is tRNA? What is its function?
26) What is point mutation? A silent mutation?
27) What is a chromosomal mutation? Name the main types. Give an example from humans.
28) How do new genes come about? Give an example?
29) What is the role of mutation in evolution?

Added Monday:
Given the Genetic Code (i.e. the table that has 64 entries and their translation) take a piece of DNA (a given single-strand from a double helix,) define the mRNA and the involved tRNA's and build the corresponding polypeptide.


November 26,  11:20 p.m.
Updated Dec 1, 7:30 p.m.