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CLEP Biology: Principles Of Evolution

Subjects : clep, science, biology
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
  • If you are not ready to take this test, you can study here.
  • Match each statement with the correct term.
  • Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.

This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. Homology has to be distinguished from ___________; for instance - the wings of insects and the wings of birds are analogous but not homologous.






2. An important step toward the modern theory of evolution came in the 1760's - when Count George-Louis Leclerc de Buffon (1707-1788) published his Natural History of Animals with the idea that species __________ over time.






3. _____________ can occur randomly - from radiation damage (impact with high energy g-rays or cosmic rays) - from exposure to chemical agents called mutagens - or simply by error in the DNA replication process.






4. The ______-____-______ Hypothesis proposes that some Homo erectus remained in Africa and continued to evolve into Homo sapiens - and left Africa about 100 -000-200 -000 years ago. From a single source - Homo sapiens replaced all populations of Homo e






5. When Charles Darwin was in the Galapagos islands - one of the first things he noticed is the variety of ___________ that existed on each of the islands.






6. Darwin's Finches illustrated ___________ ____________. This is where species all deriving from a common ancestor have over time successfully adapted to their environment via natural selection.






7. For humans - the complete classification is: Kingdom (Animalia); Phylum (__________); Class (Mammalia); Order (Primates); Family (Hominidae); Genus (Homo); Species (Sapiens).






8. _____________ struggle takes place between the individuals of different species.






9. Heritable variations are called _____________ variations. Such variations arising from changes in DNA are passed on within families and to the offspring from the parents.






10. The highest category in the Linnaean system of classification is the __________. At this level - organisms are distinguished on the basis of cellular organization and methods of nutrition.






11. The mutation may be harmful (resulting in a reduced probability of survival for the organism involved) - ____________ (it might also do its intended job better) or merely neutral (no effect at all).






12. _______________ is that branch of biology dealing with the identification and naming of organisms.






13. Jean Baptiste de Lamarck (1744-1829) developed one of the first theories on how species changed. Lamarck - in 1809 - concluded that organisms of higher complexity had __________ from preexisting - less complex organisms.






14. Mammals developed from primitive mammal-like reptiles during the __________ Period - some 200-245 million years ago.






15. Darwin reported that all organisms tend to _____________ in a geometric ratio provided there are no environmental checks. Even slow breeding animals like the elephant may theoretically give rise to 19 million descendants in a period of 750 years.






16. The most recent mass extinction - the K-T extinction at the end of the Cretaceous period - is best known for having wiped out the __________ .






17. Almost all _________ organisms are either plants or animals.






18. An allele may increase - or decrease - in frequency simply through ___________. Not every member of the population will become a parent and not every set of parents will produce the same number of offspring.






19. As the finch population began to flourish in these advantageous conditions - ______________ competition became a factor - and resources on the islands were squeezed and could not sustain the population of the finches for long.






20. Speciation by ____________ Equilibrium involves a group of creatures which gets isolated from the rest of their species.






21. According to Darwin - in spite of the high reproductive potential - the number of individuals in a species remains relatively constant - suggesting _____________ for existence.






22. The study of ____________ ____________ supports the claim of a common origin of organisms.






23. Despite their image as brutish simpletons - _____________were the first humans to bury their dead with artifacts - indicating abstract thought - perhaps a belief in an after-life.






24. Humans are ____________ - meaning we walk on two of our limbs. The amount of melanin in our skin is representative of the environment we live in - i.e. dark skinned people occupy hotter climates.






25. ___________ speciation happens when members of a population develop some genetic difference that prevents them from reproducing with the parent type.






26. Immediately below kingdom is the _________ level of classification. At this level - animals are grouped together based on similarities in basic body plan or organization.






27. Most anthropologists agree that the ______ _______ was populated by a series of three migrations over the temporary land connection between Asia and North America.






28. Homo erectus was the first hominid to use ___________ - and have social structures for food gathering.






29. The _______-_________ Law states that an equilibrium of allele frequencies in a gene pool remains in effect in each succeeding generation of a sexually reproducing population if five conditions are met.






30. Members of the phylum _____________ have soft - unsegmented bodies that are usually - but not always - enclosed in hard shells.






31. Except for the tail fins - whales greatly resemble fish in outline - but are instead descended from four-legged land ___________.






32. Extinctions - mostly at the level of species - have been occurring constantly at a low 'background rate' - usually matched by the rate at which new species appear - with the result that ____________ is constantly increasing.






33. Homology was defined by Darwin as similarity of structure and position - and distinguished from 'analogy -' which was defined as similarity of _____________ but not necessarily of structure and position.






34. Populations begin to diverge when gene flow between them is restricted. Geographic isolation is often the first step in ____________ speciation.






35. Organisms struggle for existence. Organisms with advantageous characters survive - while those which lack such variations perish. The advantageous characters are passed on to the offsprings generation after generation and the organisms become better






36. Prior to the scientific discoveries of the past 200 years - _____________ from the Book Of Genesis described how living things came into being.






37. Linnaeus placed all monkeys and apes along with humans into the order _________






38. ____________ reproduction - whether reproduction proceeds with lesser or greater success - is central to the process of natural selection; it determines whether a given mutation becomes established in the general population.






39. The early stages of development of the ___________ of fish - salamander - tortoise - hen and man show remarkable similarity.






40. There are certain animals with intermediate characters between two major groups of animals. They are called ___________ _____.






41. At some time in their life cycle - chordates have a pair of lateral gill slits or pouches used to obtain __________ in a liquid environment.






42. ___________ is a specific explanation of similarity of form seen in the biological world. In genetics - it is used in reference to protein or DNA sequences - meaning that the given sequences share ancestry.






43. Because organisms are continually tested by their changing ______________ - their forms change to suit new conditions.






44. If a population began with a few individuals - one or more of whom carried a particular allele - that allele may come to be represented in many of the descendants. This is known as ____________.






45. ____________ organs are formed on the same basic plan though they may be modified variously to perform different functions. They must have a common ancestral structure which gave rise to different modifications.






46. Scientific classification sorts living organisms by _________ levels of classification - kingdom; phylum; class; order; family; genus; and species.






47. In species which reproduce _____________ - extinction of a species is generally inevitable when there is only one individual of that species left - or only individuals of a single sex.






48. Primates evolved about approximately 30 million years ago in ___________. One branch of primates evolved into the Old and New World Monkeys - the other into the hominoids (the line of descent common to both apes and man).






49. A ___________ can be defined as one or more populations of interbreeding organisms that are reproductively isolated in nature from all other organisms.






50. Differential reproduction allows one species to gradually evolve into a new species. This is the process of ____________.