4.7- Investigating Biodiversity

Question 1

What is meant by an observable characteristic how are they used to classify organisms

Answer 1

Observable characteristics of feature that can be seen example shape of wings/type of eyes the more characteristics that two organisms having comment them more closely related they might be but this is not always the case

Question 2

How can the base sequence of DNA or mRNA be used to investigate diversity within a species

Answer 2

Select a number of individuals from the species to be studied, select a gene to look at, find the sequence of bases in the gene in each organism, look at how many differences there are in the sequences in different individuals, more differences equal more diversity within the species

Question 3

How can the base sequence of DNA or mRNA be used to investigate the diversity between species

Answer 3

Select a gene that is present in all the species of interest, example a gene that codes for a protein which is used in a process such as respiration because respiration happens in all living things, compare the base sequence of the gene in all the organisms, the more similar to be sequenced the more closely related organisms being studied

Question 4

How can the amino acid sequence of a protein be used to investigate diversity

Answer 4

Amino acid sequence is coded for by DNA, so the more similar the amino acid sequence between two individuals the more similar DNA sequence the more closely related data they are not data

Question 5

What’s the limitation of using amino acid sequences to determine diversity

Answer 5

The genetic code is the degenerate so two organisms might have the same sequence of amino acids but could have different DNA sequences

Question 6

How should random samples of stationary organisms be chosen

Answer 6

Create a grid over the area to be studied, use a computer to generate random coordinates, place a quadrant at the intersection of the coordinates, select your sample from within the quadrant

Question 7

Why is it so important that data is collected from random samples

Answer 7

To prevent bias

Question 8

What does the standard deviation tell you about a population

Answer 8

The spread of data around mean if the standard deviation is big then it means that there is a lot of variation in the population if the standard deviation is small then it means that there is not much variation in population