Evolution Final 2

Front 1

1. Legal arguments about the teaching of Creationism or Intelligent Design in public schools in the United States have centered around which two issues?

Back 1

Separation of church and state
The fact that creation via supernatural forces is not falsifiable, a requirement for science subjects

Front 2

2. What is the ultimate cause of adaptive radiations?

Back 2

Vacant ecological space

Front 3

3. Who is the father of modern taxonomy, including our system of binomial nomenclature?

Back 3

Carolus Linneaus

Front 4

4. In which higher group do we see trends towards increased brain size, specialization of teeth, and a shift of three jaw bones to form structures in the ear?

Back 4

Mammalia

Front 5

5. Based on the fossil record, at what time did the first cells and first eukaryotes appear on earth?

Back 5

Cells -between 3.5 and 2.2 Bya
Eukaryotes - about 1.5 Bya

Front 6

6. Which model of evolution explains groups with very rapid bursts of divergence during the process of speciation?

Back 6

Punctuated Equilibrium

Front 7

7. I notice several separate groups of organisms found only on the southern continents (Africa, South America, Australia). What best accounts for this?

Back 7

Speciation after break up of Gondwana

Front 8

8. Give an example of the type of gene you would use to do a phylogeographic study of humans? Why?

Back 8

Mitochondrial or Y chromosome No recombination

Front 9

9. Where would I find the highest levels of endemism?

Back 9

Remote islands

Front 10

10. Why is there a sharp spike in the species origination rate at the Permian/Triassic boundary?

Back 10

Filling of ecological space after the Permian extinction

Front 11

List two causes of homoplasy and give a specific example of each cause.

Back 11

Convergent Evolution - Mollusk and vertebrate eyes
Parallel Evolution - changes in third codon position in protein coding genes
Evolutionary Reversals- loss of functional wings in birds
Mimicry - butterflies look like each other to reduce predation

Front 12

What is pleiotropy?

Back 12

When one gene affects 2 or more traits

Front 13

2. What is a pseudogene?

Back 13

A non-functional gene that is still similar in sequence to another gene due to a duplication event

Front 14

3. What is the ultimate cause of linkage disequilibrium?

Back 14

Proximity of genes on a chromosome

Front 15

4. In what type of population structure might I see character displacement?

Back 15

Sympatric

Front 16

5. List three reasons why an effective population size might be smaller than a census population size.

Back 16

1. Variation in # of offspring among individuals
2. Uneven sex ration
3. Overlap of generations
4. Natural Selection
5. Population size fluctuations

Front 17

6. Give an example of a locus you would expect to evolve at a neutral, or nearly neutral rate.

Back 17

Any locus for which there is little or no selection (pseudogene; non-coding portion of DNA; genes with many alleles, but no selective advantage)

Front 18

7. What is the most common force that moves populations across adaptive valleys to a higher adaptive peak?

Back 18

Genetic Drift

Front 19

8. What is one reason a character trait might become vestigial?

Back 19

1. No longer any selective pressure so random mutations and drift remove it from population
2. There may be selective pressure to lose it so resources can be directed elsewhere

Front 20

9. Why don't populations ever exhibit a high percentage of individuals who display "dishonest" fitness signals?

Back 20

Once the dishonest signal is represented at high frequencies it no longer conveys a selective advantage, because it is recognized as dishonest.

Front 21

10. Under what conditions is a host-parasite relationship likely to become mutualistic?

Back 21

When transmission of the parasite is vertical (parent  offspring) it is an advantage for the parasite to switch to a mutualist.

Front 22

1. What are the two types of point mutations? On average which has the most effect on phenotype and why?

Back 22

1. Substitution
2. Insertion/Deletion
Insertion/Deletions are the most serious because they change the reading frame and result in a non-functional protein.

Front 23

3. List three factors that influence the rate of fixation for an adaptive mutation and explain how each one affects this rate.

Back 23

1. Initial frequency of adaptation - higher frequencies lead to faster fixation
2. Dominance system - dominant alleles increase in frequency rapidly, but then take a long time to become fixed, recessive alleles increase slowly at first, but then achieve fixation quickly
3. Size of coefficient of selection - the more advantageous an allele the more quickly it becomes fixed

Front 24

4. Give an example of evolutionary conflict between selection at different biological levels. What is the effect of this conflict on genetic diversity?

Back 24

Transposable elements have positive selection at the genetic level, but if they interfere with the fitness of individuals they have negative selection at the individual level. This would result in a large diversity for the transposable element, but reduce diversity for other genes.
(Other examples are possible)

Front 25

I have a population of lab raised model organisms and I perform a series of artificial selection experiments over a short number of generations in which I fix an allele that causes bright orange eyes. I also notice that several other alleles that code for different traits and were not selected for have also become fixed even though they were variable in my original population. What is the most likely explanation for this?

Back 25

Closely linked genes hitchhicked with the gene that was selected for and also became fixed.

Front 26

1. What is a species?

Back 26

A variety of answers are acceptable: ie., a irreducible, genetically isolated, monophyletic population of organisms

Front 27

2. Under what circumstances might you find introgression?

Back 27

A species hybrid zone with a small number of hybrids mating with both species

Front 28

3. A single flightless bird species is found on Continent X. Continental drift Continent X into two land masses resulting in two distinct species. What type of speciation is this?

Back 28

Allopatric

Front 29

4. What is it called when females choose a mate based on very specific behavioral or display traits?

Back 29

Sexual selection

Front 30

5. What happens to diversity within a population as competition increases?

Back 30

It goes up (increases)

Front 31

6. Why is some "non-coding" DNA highly conserved between distantly related species/

Back 31

It has some sort of conserved function, such as regulation

Front 32

7. What is the name for a gene that originated as a duplicate of another gene and then becomes non-functional?

Back 32

pseudogene

Front 33

8. What is allometry?

Back 33

A change in the relative rate of growth for a specific morphological feature

Front 34

9. What mode of species origination is thought to be responsible for punctuated equilibrium?

Back 34

peripatric

Front 35

10. Give an example of a living fossil.

Back 35

Shark, alligator, coeleocanth, tadpole shrimp, etc.

Front 36

1. What are the three types of barriers to gene flow? Give an example of each one.

Back 36

1. Pre-mating barriers
a. species that don’t mate because of incompatible mating behaviors
b. species that don’t mate because of different ecological preferences
2. Post-mating/Pre-zygotic barriers
a. species that have incompatible genitalia
b. species with gametes that are incompatible
3. Post-zygotic barriers
a. hybrids that are unable to procure a mate from either parents' species
b. sterile hybrids

Front 37

2. I find a new species of a tree from the amazon rainforest; a very stable environment with only an occasional clearing in the canopy for new trees to fill. Based on this information predict the expected life history strategy of this tree. Include information about frequency of reproduction, investment in each offspring, and why you would expect this

Back 37

The tree would most likely have an iteroparous life history, forming seeds throughout a long life. This would increase the chances of at least a few of the seeds sprouting in or near an opening in the canopy. Each seed would also have a relatively large energy investment, because this would allow seedlings to grow very quickly initially and compete with other seedlings.

Front 38

3. The phylogeny for a group of insects and a group of bacteria found inside the insects are identical. Is coevolution occurring? If so, what type? What kind of relationship would you expect to find between these insects and bacteria?

Back 38

Yes, specific coevolution. These groups share a very close relationship so that when speciation occurs in one lineage a comparable speciation event occurs in the other. This is most likely an obligate mutualistic relationship, like a host-endosymbiont relationship.

Front 39

4. List three different ways to visualize gene expression and what type of molecule is being visualized. Which one is most useful in living organisms?

Back 39

1. in-situ hybridization  mRNA
2. antibody staining  protein
3. reporter gene  reporter protein that is expressed along with the target gene

Front 40

What type of gene might you expect to have an elevated dN/dS for the human lineage and why?

Back 40

Genes that have to do with brain development, because this is one of the features that is pronounced in the human lineage when compared to close relatives.