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Human Life Biology

Complete the following questions using the textbook ( link attached below )

Chapter 13

Antibiotic Resistance and introduction to evolution

What is staph, and can a person have it even when they are not sick?

Are bacteria “good” or “bad” for our health? Can you give an example of one that is beneficial and one that can be harmful?

How do bacteria resist the effects of antibiotics? Why aren’t human cells harmed by antibiotics?

What are mutations? Are they beneficial/harmful/neutral?

How do bacterial cells obtain new genes? Can you describe transformation, conjugation, and transduction?

What is “evolution”? From the perspective of a biologist.

How do populations evolve? What is the role of evolution in antibiotic resistance?

Do some species evolve faster than other species? Explain.

What is “fitness”? Can you describe how fitness interacts with environmental change?

What is “natural selection”? What conditions are necessary for natural selection to occur?

What is “adaptation”? Is evolution adaptive? Why/why not?

What are directional selection, stabilizing selection, and diversifying selection? Can you give an example of each?

What is “speciation”? Can you give an example?

What observations did Darwin make about nature that helped shape his thinking about evolution?

Chapter 14

What is a gene pool?

What are the mechanisms of evolution? (mutation, migration (aka gene flow), drift, selection) Can you describe and give examples of each of these types of evolution? Are they adaptive or nonadaptive?

What is a genetic bottleneck?

What is a genetic founder effect?

What is inbreeding/inbreeding depression? What about “outbreeding depression”?

What is a “species”?

Can you describe the biological species concept, morphological species concept, and phylogenetic species concept? Are there situations where one of the three might be the most useful/relevant, or situations where each of the three might not be useful?

Can you describe and give examples of different modes of reproductive isolation? What is prezygotic reproductive isolation vs. postzygotic reproductive isolation? Consider each of the modes of reproductive isolation shown on page 339 of your textbook.

What does it mean if someone says that a population is in “Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium”? What conditions need to be met in order for a population to be in H-W equilibrium? There is a nice description, pages 334-335 of your textbook.

With respect to Hardy-Weinberg, what do p and q represent? What do p2, q2, and 2pq represent? How can you use information about phenotype and genotype frequencies to determine if a population is in H-W equilibrium?

Chapter 15

Evidence for Evolution

What are five primary lines of evidence that support evolutionary theory? (fossils, biogegoraphy, comparative anatomy and embryology, molecular biology, lab and field experiments)

What are fossils? How are fossils made? What is the “fossil record”?Why are there gaps in the fossil record? How can we determine how old fossils are? What kinds of fossils can we find? What can we learn from fossils? What are some limitations of fossils?

Compare and contrast dating using radioisotopes with relative dating.

What is an invertebrate?

What is a tetrapod?

What is “Tiktaalik”? Why is it referred to as an intermediate fossil?

What is a “homology”? Can you give an example?

What is an “analogy” or analogous structure? Can you give an example?

What three features do the early embryos of many vertebrates share?

What evidence that could support evolution is still missing/lacking? Do you think we will eventually find it? How can it be discovered?

Chapter 16

Life on Earth

How old is the earth? How do we know?

What factors help explain the current distribution of species on earth?

What is continental drift and plate tectonics?

What are radiometric dating, radioactive isotopes, half-life, and sedimentary rock?

Pay attention to the table on page 375 – how are the different eras shown characterized? What is a “mass extinction”? What might cause a mass extinction?

What is “adaptive radiation”?

What is “convergent evolution”? Can you give an example?

What are “vertebrates”? What are “Mammals”?

Chapter 19

Human Evolution

What contributes to human skin color? Why is there so much variation in skin color among different populations?

Where did the earliest humans evolve? How do we know?

What can we learn about human evolution from genetics and the fossil record?

What is melanin?

What is folate? Why do humans need it? How does sun exposure affect a person’s folate levels? What are possible consequences of folate deficiency?

What is Vitamin D? Why do humans need it? How does sun exposure affect a person’s Vitamin D levels? What are possible consequences of Vitamin D deficiency?

What is mitochondrial DNA? How is it inherited? Who is “mitochondrial Eve”? How long ago was she alive? Were other humans alive at the time?

Link to the textbook https://www.dropbox.com/s/w1wwqw8xsomblln/Scientific%20American%20Biology%20for%20a%20Changing%20World.pdf?dl=0