ENY 3005 Study Guide - Quiz Guide: Dot Moth, Lek Mating, Onthophagus

Decide if each of the following is an example of inductive or deductive reasoning.

1. All the flying birds and insects have wings. Birds and insects flap their wings as they move through the air. Therefore, wings enable flight.

2. Insects generally survive mild winters better than harsh ones. Therefore, insect pests will become more problematic if global temperatures increase.

3. Chromosomes, the carriers of DNA, separate into daughter cells during cell division. Therefore, each daughter cell will have the same chromosome set as the mother cell.

4. Animals as diverse as humans, insects, and wolves all exhibit social behavior. Therefore, social behavior must have an evolutionary advantage.

!. Describe in detail how insertion,deletion, and base substitution of nucleotides can have asignificant impact on genes. Find three specific examples (actualgene mutations, not chromosome mutations) of ways in which avery small change in DNA can have a major impact on an organism,and describe each mutation in detail.

2. Why do agricultural researchers intentionally producepolyploid crop plants? Explain in detail what polyploidy means anddiscuss different types of polyploid plants. Give four specific detailed examples ofactual commercial crops that are polyploid. In each case explainwhy polyploidy is advantageous. Also, indicate whether thepolyploidy occurred naturally or describe how botanists created thenew varieties. Why is it more common for polyploidy to occur inplants than in animals? Give examples of types of animals that havebeen found to exhibit polyploidy.

Animals use their sensory systems to acquire information about many diverse and behaviorally relevant stimuli, ranging from a preferred food item to an approaching predator or the song of a potential mate. In order to make adaptive decisions, animals must constantly make critical judgments about various features of the stimuli they encounter. One such general feature important in nearly all animal behaviors can be described as “stimulus intensity” (e.g., how big is it, or how close is it, or how loud is it, or how bright is it?). This is a key feature of stimuli that an animal’s nervous system must encode. In a concise and well-informed essay that uses terms, concepts, and ideas from this course and discusses all relevant similarities and differences, describe how variation in stimulus intensity can be encoded in (i) postsynaptic potentials, (ii) action potentials, and (iii) compound action potentials.