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The final exam is a very long and difficult exam, with almost all the
questions based on science news articles. It has about 50
multiple choice questions and about six pages of other questions--
essays, short answer, graphs and diagrams. The multiple
choice is one third of the grade, the other questions are another
third, and the best third counts twice. Overall, it's like the
other tests, only longer and with new questions.
More than half of the questions emphasize material covered after
the last test, and many other questions are related to the same
material, for example, cell structures and molecules involved in
respiration and their connections to electrons and energy and
pH. More examples include potential energy stored in C-H
bond calories and how that energy and its conversion can explain the
the one-tenth law of ecology; also, the effects of fossil fuel
use on acid rain, and the effects of acid rain on soil calcium and
aluminum, and the resulting problems of tree deaths. There will
be a few questions which have may seem to have no direct connection
with what we've studied lately: Golgi bodies and ER,
protein motors and spindle fibers, DNA/biotech tools and
applications in the news, stem cells, fossils, ethics issues
arising from all sorts of biological advances, simple
genetics problems and terms, mitosis and meiosis, sex....
PRIORITIES FOR STUDYING
A general guideline is that preparation for each college exam should
take about 10 hours. If you really really need to make a
better grade than what you've been making on tests for the course, you
might need more and smarter studying.
- Review experiment summary logic. The exam will have a
bunch of news stories and other examples which require summaries. These parts are easily worth
more than a letter grade, like the difference between an A and a B
on the exam.
- Chapter 1
in the textbook was a preview of the most
important principles of biology; now it's a review. Go back
and study it carefully, including these
textbook
web questions: summary #2-11, 15, 18-20.
- Review the Central Dogma of modern molecular genetics
because the most common news stories in science these days involve
genes and the tools used in modern genetics experiments.
- Study these chapters and their study guides:
- Review these labs, especially the parts about "what you
will be responsible for...."
- Population Simulations
(especially noting the graphs, the extinction vortex/stochasticiy
connections, and the differences in countries' population
growth rates ( %).
- Diversity III (be
prepared to discuss various hypotheses about what causes
decreases in species diversity and how these decreases can be
measured in experiments)
- Ethical Issues (identify
ethical issues, especially in news stories; be able to explain
the science and molecular tools involved, and be able to summarize at least two
opposing viewpoints about what should be the right thing to do,
and more!)
- More DNA evidence (you need to
remember that
- DNA --> RNA -->protein's amino acid sequence
- the amino acid sequence determines the shape (and
function) of the protein, because
- each amino acid has a different R-group, some nonpolar,
some polar, and some charged, and
Even though about half of you never got this right,
you must be able to explain which details of the R-groups make them basic or hydrophobic or
whatever, and why. Check out pp. 45 and 52-54. You have to talk about the actual atomic arrangement of the
specific R-groups of these amino acids and whether the
electrons form ionic bonds or even covalent bonds or
uneven covalent bonds. AND why!)
- Practice reading news stories, especially trying to identify
hypotheses and actual experiments, including how their molecular
tools worked. Some samples will be
described below by December.
- Review these study guides and labs, listed in approximate order
of importance:
- Review your marks in the textbook for the chapters listed above.
- Check yourself by
- trying the quiz questions on the study guides above
- trying the sample tests
- 1999 population
and behavioral ecology questions 2000
- respiration test
- enzyme test
- most of the questions on the exam will be more like the
quiz questions on the study guides than like these old
tests.
- Review again the questions you missed
NEWS Stories which could be on the
exam.
Also see news stories from recent study guides!
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