ANBI 139 EXAM QUESTIONS ANSWERED CORRECTLY LATEST UPDATE 2026

ANBI 139 EXAM QUESTIONS ANSWERED CORRECTLY LATEST UPDATE 2026 Give an example of heritable and non-heritable variation - Answers Eye color (heritable) and tattoos (non-heritable) Give an example of random and non-random events during biological evolution - Answers Mutation (random), survival under certain environmental conditions (non-random) What happens to the rate of evolution in small populations? - Answers Rate gets higher, evolution accelerates What are the three key ingredients of biological evolution? - Answers Replicating entities, heritable variation, differential reproduction What is the difference between somatic cells and germ cells? - Answers Somatic cells are the majority of the cells in the body, germ cells are the ones that can give rise to gametes Can somatic mutations be passed on to the next generation? - Answers No, only germ line mutations can Are most mutations dangerous to the survival of the individual in which they occur? - Answers No, most mutations appear neutral Why is the evolutionary tree of life made up of branches? - Answers Because most of the time, once two populations have stopped exchanging DNA, they become incompatible and cannot exchange DNA again Why is it impossible to place viruses on the tree of life? - Answers Viruses do not contain any DNA that can be directly compared to the DNA in cellular life forms What does convergent evolution mean? - Answers Independent evolution leading to similar outcomes (ie. spindle-shaped swimmers, caffeine) What four different perspectives on disease can be considered? - Answers Patient, doctor/care provider, evolving pathogen, evolving host Give a proximate mechanism for disease - Answers Mutation in important immune genes (ex. interleukin 10) Give an evolutionary explanation for disease - Answers Hygiene hypothesis What is the size of a human cell, a bacterium, and that of a virus? - Answers Human (30 micrometers), bacterium (3 micrometers), virus (100 nanometers) Can a mutation in a single gene cause disease? - Answers Yes, there are over 4000 human diseases caused by a single gene mutation! What is the pathogen that causes malaria? - Answers Several species of the protozoan called Plasmodium. What is the pathogen that causes tuberculosis? - Answers The bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis. What is the pathogen that causes HIV/AIDS? - Answers The HIV virus, a lentivirus belonging to the group of retroviruses. Why is the name SIV a misnomer? - Answers Because the virus does not cause immunodeficiency in most non-human primates Why is it impossible to rid the world of influenza A virus? - Answers Because there is a huge and diverse reservoir of influenza viruses in wild water birds What is unusual about prion diseases? - Answers They are caused by a mis-folded protein, not by a living, replicating organism. A mis-folded protein from outside the body causes additional mis-folding of the patient's own prion molecules (mad cow disease). What is the origin of the word vaccination? - Answers The latin word vacca = cow, given that cowpox was used to immunize humans against smallpox What is the difference between variolation and vaccination? - Answers Variolation is immunization using smallpox virus, vaccination is immunization against smallpox using the related cow pox virus. What is the difference between variolation and vaccination? - Answers Variolation (inoculation) uses scabs from smallpox patients to immunize naive persons, while vaccinations use scabs from cows infected by cow pox to immunize against smallpox. Vaccination has since been applied to other methods of immunization. How long is the haploid genome of each of our cells and how many "letters" base pairs does it contain? - Answers About 1 meter long and it contains 3 billion bp. What does chromatin consist of? - Answers Histone and non-histone proteins and DNA Give three examples of chromosomal changes during evolution? - Answers Fusion, inversion, reciprocal translocation How can different parts of the genome have different histories? - Answers Genetic recombination breaks apart and brings together different parts of the genome. The further apart on a chromosome two segments of DNA are, the likelier that these do not share the same precise history. What 2 different parts of our genomes do not get reshuffled but are rather inherited from one parent only? - Answers Mitochondrial DNA and most of the Y-chromosome What are the four major classes of biomolecules? - Answers Nucleic acids, proteins, lipids and glycans How many pieces of DNA are there in the nuclear genome of a human? - Answers 46, visible as chromosome when a cell is dividing What is a haplotype? - Answers A unique combination of DNA variants along the same strand of DNA What are post-translational modifications? - Answers Changes to protein molecules after these have been synthesized (translated from mRNA). What could be the advantage of our genomes having multiple versions (copies) of the same gene (e.g. hemoglobin)? - Answers Slightly different variants of the same gene can be used at different times during development and life (embryonic, fetal, adult) What is an enhancer (in the genome)? - Answers A stretch of DNA that interacts with transcription factors and the promoter of genes to regulate their expression. Give two examples of RNA that is functional despite the fact that it does not code for a protein - Answers Ribosomal RNA is part of the RNA translating machinery of a cell, micro RNA takes on a 3 D fold and can interact with proteins to modify gene expression Give four characteristics of the genome that can affect gene expression? - Answers Chromatin remodeling, histone modification, DNA methylation, non-coding and micro RNA (+RNA binding proteins, DNA-binding proteins = transcription factors) What does the queen bee have to do with epigenetic? - Answers Enzymes acting on histone modifications in the royal jelly produced by workers bees and fed to the developing queen larva cause the same egg to become a queen rather than a worker. How can the chemical modification of histone proteins influence gene activity? - Answers Histone modifications can change the accessibility of gene expression machinery to DNA. What is the ratio of human to microbial cells in and on your body? - Answers Roughly 1 to 1. How many times smaller than you is an average bacterium? - Answers One million times. How are microbiota like micro Serengetis? - Answers They represent complex communities of multiple species How could human hosts benefit from genes in the genome of their microbiome? - Answers Microbial enzymes can digest food and generate vitamins Name two ways in which biological and cultural inheritance are similar and two ways in which they differ - Answers Both types of inheritance represent transmission of information, both are affected by change over time; cultural inheritance does not include the inheritance of genetic information and it can spread horizontally or even from younger to older generations. Give an example of an important human technology that does not fossilize? - Answers Fiber technology, ropes, strings, baskets, fabrics. How can personal names and language affect individual behavior? - Answers It allows for reputations as the actions of the named reported to a wide social network and affect that individual's social standing Which of the modern online services relies heavily on reputation? - Answers A. Amazon B. Ebay C. Air B&B What is aneuploidy? - Answers Deviation from normal chromosome numbers Why were bacteria and protozoa discovered long before viruses? - Answers Because viruses are sub-cellular parasites that cannot be seen by light microscopy What is Koch's postulates? - Answers The notion that proof for pathogenesis by an agent requires that the microorganism must be found in abundance in all organisms suffering from the diseases, but should not be found in healthy organisms. The microorganism must be isolated from a diseased organism and grow in pure culture. The cultured microorganism should cause disease when introduced into a healthy organism. The microorganism must be reisolated from the inoculated, diseased experimental host and identified as being identical to the original specific causative agent. List four different types of host defenses - Answers Mucus barrier, skin, antimicrobial toxins, immune cells What is horror autotoxicus? - Answers The horror of having one's own powerful immune system unleashed against oneself. How much larger is a human macrophage vs. a bacterium? - Answers 4 to 40 times larger. How does the macrophage recognize the bacteria? - Answers By using innate immune receptors that recognize pathogen associated molecular patterns (PAMPs). How thick is human skin? - Answers Around 2 mm What is the total surface of the human skin? - Answers 2 square meters without the folds, 25 square meters with. What is mucus made of? - Answers Mucus is a hydrated biogel consisting mostly of hydrated, highly glycosylated mucin glycoproteins, but also salts and anti-microbial proteins. What is the BBB? - Answers A specially tight layer inside all the blood vessels in and around the brain? What kind of information does the immune system process? - Answers Molecular information about self and non-self, consisting of composition and shape of molecules and the patterns these form. List two cell types in the body that lose their genomes as they mature - Answers RBC, platelets, lens cells of the eyes List three similarities between our immune system and the brain - Answers Similar number of cells, long development after birth, process information What are the innate immune receptors? - Answers Proteins made by a host organism (germ line encoded, even in absence of immunization) that recognize molecular patterns on potential pathogens and parasites. How does the rich diversity of alleles at many of the genes encoding innate immune receptors become apparent? - Answers Individual humans can react very differently to the same pathogens How can liquid blood rapidly form a clot? - Answers Blood is super charged with proteins that can react to contact with oxygen and form mesh works of fibers that can crosslink and entrap platelets, thus forming a clot. Horse shoe crabs and other invertebrates lack an adaptive immune system. How do these animals protect themselves against infection? - Answers Their innate immune systems produce protective proteins that recognize bacterial molecules. What does clonal selection in the immune system refer to? - Answers B-cells that make antibodies which bind antigens well, are allowed to replicate as clones, rapidly increasing the fraction of these B-cells over other, that fail to produce such antibodies. How does the adaptive immune system prevent cells from reacting against self? - Answers Developing immune cells that recognize self too strongly are forced to undergo apoptosis. How many protein chains make up a single antibody? - Answers Four, two light and two heavy chains. Give three cell types involved in innate immunity and three involved in adaptive immunity. - Answers Neutrophil, macrophage, basophil. B-cell, T-cell, T-helper cell. What is the difference between MHC and HLA? - Answers HLA is the human MHC How does human breast milk improve infant health? - Answers It contains prebiotics and that help the infant gut be colonized by the right bacteria, probiotics in the form of bacteria, and it contains maternal antibodies that attenuate infections in the infant, and it modulates infant immune development. What does SAMP stand for? - Answers Self associated molecular patterns. Can you name four autoimmune diseases - Answers rheumathoid arthritis: self attack on joints multiple sclerosis: self attack on central nervous system type 1 diabetes: self attack on pancreatic islet cells that secrete insulin inflammatory bowel disease: self attack on gut tissue and or associated microbes What is the concept of friendly fire in immune responses? - Answers Immune responses can result in damage to the "self", tissues, or processes of our own bodies. What is a monoclonal antibody? - Answers A specific antibody made by one clone of B-cells (these can be isolated and then mass-produced by introducing the DNA sequence encoding this specific antibody into a cell line). What is an example of a behavioral defense against infection in primates? - Answers Grooming behavior, often reciprocal. List 2 examples each of viral, bacterial, fungal, protozoan, helminth, and prion caused diseases. - Answers Polio and flu, gonorrhea and TB, candidasis and valley fever, malaria and sleeping sickness, schistosomiasis and elephantiasis, Kuru and Creutzfeldt Jakobs. What is the generation time of viruses, bacteria, parasitic worms, and humans respectively? - Answers Minutes, hours, weeks, decades What two key features allow most pathogens to evolve more rapidly than their hosts? - Answers Rapid generation time and high mutation rates Which pathogens ahem the smallest genomes? - Answers Viruses How can sex allow more slowly evolving hosts to survive in the face of rapidly evolving pathogens? - Answers The shuffling of genetic material via recombination between chromosomes generates novel combinations each generation How does meiosis differ from regular cell division? - Answers Meiosis (reduction division), involves not just the doubling of DNA, but also the recombination of chromosomes and the halving of the DNA content in the resulting sex cells. What is the two-fold cost of sex? - Answers Sexually reproducing populations require twice as many individuals for the same number of reproductive events. Which kind of reproduction allows novel mutations to spread more rapidly, sexual or asexual reproduction? - Answers Sexually reproducing populations Can you think of an example of viral sex? - Answers Viruses can have segmented genome (influenza A) and co-infection of two different viruses can lead to recombined viral progeny. What is a molecular polymorphism and give an example. - Answers Inherited molecular variation where at least 1% of the population differs from the rest (ABO histo-blood groups). What does secretor mean in the context of ABO blood groups? - Answers Most people also produce the ABO antigens on their secretions, a minority of people only produce them within their blood vasculature. What kind of molecular receptors are used by Norovirus (infamously cruise ship viruses) - Answers ABO antigens (glycans) How is infection by an enveloped virus like a nano-transplantation? - Answers Enveloped viruses are wrapped in the cell membrane of the host in which they were produced. In a new host, this can make them antigenic. What type of infections are influenced by ABO blood groups and affect disease susceptibility? - Answers Viral, bacterial, protozoan, fungal, and helminthic infections. How can herd immunity protect susceptible individuals in a population? - Answers If the fraction of immunized individuals is high enough (70 to 90% depending on pathogen), the few susceptible individuals will be shielded by immune individuals. What is hemolytic disease of the newborn? - Answers A life-threatening condition where a baby is born with maternal antibodies against its own blood. What is the reason that glycans are massively involved in infection and immunity? - Answers This class of biomolecule is abundant at the "molecular frontier" of cells and tissues. Sialic acids are exploited by many important pathogens for invasion and immune evasion. How come vertebrate hosts did not evolve away from using sialic acids on their cells? - Answers Vertebrates have become critically dependent on using sialic acids for development, they cannot afford to abolish these molecules. How can mucins be resistant to digestion? - Answers The tightly arranged glycans make it impossible for protease enzymes to digest the core protein. What is the difference between Neu5Ac sialic acid found in all vertebrate and the Neu5Gc sialic acid lost in the human lineage? - Answers The presence of one additional oxygen atom in the non-human Neu5Gc. What prevents a virus that uses the alphaGal antigen as a receptor from infecting humans? - Answers The complete absense of alphaGal on human cells. What makes pig kidneys super antigenic in a human xenotransplant recipient? - Answers The presence of alpha Gal on all pig cells combined with high levels of pre-existing anti-alphaGal antibodies in all humans What is the difference between horizontal and vertical transmission of a pathogen? - Answers Horizontal is across a population via infection, vertical is infection from parent to offspring. How can infection by multiple strains of a pathogen lead to increased virulence? - Answers It can lead to competition between strains, which can result in higher damage to the host. How does the malaria parasite manipulate mosquito behavior in its favor? - Answers Plasmodium causes mosquitoes to take blood meals from more different hosts, increasing the rate of infection of humans by a single mosquito. Why do waterborne diseases tend to be rather virulent (cause very severe disease)? - Answers The pathogen is more likely to be passed on if the patient has diarrhea and vomits, ideally near water sources...the patient does not need to walk around or look attractive to infect others. What triggers human immune systems to form circulating antibodies to alphaGal and ABO? - Answers The presence of alphaGal and ABO sugar chains on bacteria of our normal gut microbiome. What is alphaGal syndrome? - Answers An acute immune reaction to a meal heavy with red meat after having been stung by a long star tick. How can increased contact with fresh water change the pathogen regime of human populations? - Answers Through increased exposure to waterborne diseases including schistosomiasis, guinea worm, leptospirosis, etc. Why is schistosomiasis widespread in East Asia? - Answers Paddy rice agriculture forces farmers into long hours of work standing in water. How could the use of a home base contribute to disease load? - Answers It likely increased the chances of infection due to shared space and accumulation of bodily waste in a limited area. How would a larger number of prey animals contribute to altering the pathogen load? - Answers Each species carries its own collection of microbes, by handling the carcasses of more different species, human ancestors would have samples of larger numbers of pathogens. What made hominins good at obtaining bone marrow form the long bones of large animals? - Answers Their cooperation in chasing away other predators or scavengers (hyenas and lions) and their use of stone tools to get access to fresh marrow and brain tissue after breaking the bones and skulls. List five ways in which fire massively changed the opportunities of humans before agriculture. - Answers Protection from predators, cooking, lighting, changing landscapes, harvesting honey How might the regular use of fire and tuberculosis be related? - Answers Fire brings people together and damages lungs. Where are people still most affected from indoor fire smoke inhalation? - Answers Africa and India How could trade have affected the history of human diseases? - Answers Repeated long-distance contacts and exchanges could have spread infectious diseases. What novel risk did agriculture bring for people? - Answers Famine, warfare, taxation, social inequality What is the neolithic? - Answers The period encompassing the last 12,000 years since humans have become sedentary, started farming/herding and developed complex societies. Farming made many new human endeavors possible, but it also ushered in or amplified the 7 Ps. List the seven Ps: - Answers Poverty, poor health, plunder, politics, power differentials, pathogens, parasites How could larger cities have contributed to disease burden? - Answers High density of people, better for spread of infectious disease likely to cause more social stress, water supply very prone to getting infected, cities rely on trade, trade can bring disease. What was the contrast in animal domestication between the Old World (Asia and Europe) and the New World (the Americas) - Answers Far fewer animal species domesticated in the New World: dogs arrive with first waves from Asia, turkey, llama/alpaca, guinea pig. What is the disease called pellagra? - Answers A vitamin deficiency stemming from the lack of adequate preparation of corn (lack of nixtamalization) How is it possible that doctors in 1840s were not aware of bacterial infections? - Answers It predated the notion of "microbes" or "germs", only visible by microscopes and totally overlooked by all medical traditions Name three ways in which industrial development can change disease burden - Answers Pollution, urbanization, social injustice How could number of menstrual cycles be affecting female cancer risk? - Answers Hormonal fluctuation and resulting tissue remodeling in the uterus associated with each cycle introduce opportunity for cancer-causing mutations to occur. What is the evidence that human breastmilk contains brain food? - Answers The brains of breast fed babies differ biochemically from those of formula fed babies. list two military technologies that have caused longterm health sequelae in civilian populations. - Answers Nuclear bombs and defoliating agents How does paternal age affect the risk for genetic disease in a child? - Answers Most mutations happen in the father and more happen the older he is What is iatrogenic disease? - Answers A disease caused by medical professionals Give an example of improved technology that causes disease - Answers Tampons with extremely good absorbance and TSS What is the key concept of the hygiene hypothesis? - Answers Improved hygiene, frequent use of antibiotics, and vaccination deprives children of contact with microbes and shifts the balance of the immune system towards becoming allergy/ prone to auto-immune reactions. List for areas where the human footprint is particularly measurable on the planet. - Answers East Asia, South Asia, Europe, Eastern North America Why is Africa the only continent that still has such large numbers of wild animals? - Answers African animals evolved with humans, they are people smart. Large animals on other continents were taken by surprise when these bipedal primates with their efficient hunting tools arrived, many of them died out. What is the size of a virus? - Answers ~ 100 nanometers or 10^-7 meters How do logging roads contribute to increased contact between human and wildlife? - Answers Once in place, local humans who often are desperate to find new livelihoods follow these new roads and establish camps along them, and then hunt for animal proteins in areas that had very little human-wildlife contact. How could shipments of car tires affect global disease? - Answers Rain water in old car tires allows mosquitoes to breed and provide unintended transport of novel mosquito species across continents What was one of the many negative effects of the transatlantic slave trade on global disease? - Answers African infectious disease and their mosquito vector species arrived in the Americas. What technology has made the discovery of new viruses much easier? - Answers Molecular detection (PCR, next generation sequencing, allowing the detection of viruses in primary samples without prior culture to amplify virus numbers) Which pathogen was first believed to cause the flu during the 1918 pandemic? - Answers The bacterium Haemophilus influenza, people were not aware of the virus What do the letter H and N in the names of different influenza A viruses stand for? - Answers Hemagglutinin for binding to cells via sialic acid, and Neuraminidase for cutting off sialic acid from cells or mucins. What is the role of elf cilia in our airways? - Answers They are responsible for moving mucus along and dispatching potential infectious agents caught in the mucus layer. What factor could cause very closely related species such as humans and chimpanzees to have very susceptibility to infection by a given virus? - Answers Changes in nature and/or distribution of cell surface molecules How can mucus impact infection risk by a virus? - Answers The mucus can contain receptor molecules for viruses and act as a decoy/smokescreen. Why is it totally unrealistic to eradicate influenza viruses? - Answers They have a gigantic reservoir in many species of wild water birds that migrate across the planet What is unusual about the genome of the Influenza A virus? - Answers Its RNA genome is segmented into 8 pieces Which factors helped spark the HIV/AIDS pandemic? - Answers Colonialism, mass migration, urban centers including sex workers, intercontinental medical aid, blood commerce, sex tourism, IV drug use. How would the reuse of glass syringes lead to serial passaging? - Answers Contaminated body fluids from the first person injected would then be injected into the next person on whom the unsterilized syringe is used How could logging roads affect emerging diseases? - Answers Local people and immigrants use the road to access new areas where they farm and hunt for bushmeat. Why are bats so important for monitoring emerging viral diseases? - Answers Their high mobility and resistance to viruses make them ideal reservoirs List five major classes of human pathogens - Answers Viruses, bacteria, protozoans, helminths and fungi & prions. List three types of different anti-viral vaccines with regard to how these are produced and delivered to humans - Answers Inactivated, attenuated live, subunit, genetic, viral vector List two components each of the cellular and humoral immune system - Answers B-cells and macrophages, antibodies, and complement What do you call a disease in non-human animals caused by a human pathogen? - Answers An anthroponosis Why do so many viral diseases have origins in African primates? - Answers Humans are African primates, which greatly facilitates cross-over infections What type of cancers can safely be diagnosed in fossils as old as Homo erectus from over 1 million years ago? - Answers Bone cancers including osteosarcomas What is the difference between a neoplasm and cancer? - Answers Neoplasia is uncontrolled cell growth that can be benign, cancer includes major genetic accidents and eventually metastasis (dispersal of cancer cells through the body) What are the five foundations of multicellularity? - Answers Proliferation inhibition, controlled cell death, extracellular environment, division of labor, resource allocation. What is an important trade-off faced by cancerous cells? - Answers Proliferation via rapid cell division, versus migration and mobility to invade the body Why can we compare the body of an individual human a clone? - Answers All body cells derive from the same fertilized egg and share the same genome Give two examples each of solid tumors and liquid tumors - Answers Solid: Carcinoma and Sarcoma, liquid: leukemia and lymphoma How can different cell types be generated from the identical genome shared by all cells found in an individual? - Answers Through differential gene expression, with different subsets of all 22,000 genes expressed to different degrees, in different combinations, and at different times Name three cells types in mammals that have evolved to invade the body of another individual - Answers Sperm, trophoblast, transmissible tumores in carnivores What are carcinomas, sarcomas, and leukemia cancers? - Answers Epithelial, muscle, or white blood cell cancers Why is cancer not really a single disease? - Answers Many different causes, different cancers have different properties and vary in how rapidly they cause death. Give three environmental causes for DNA damage - Answers Chemical substances, radiation, viruses. How could a virus cause cancer? - Answers Viruses can manipulate gene expression and "immortalize infected cells;" viruses can cause mutations by inserting their own DNA into the host cell genome. What is a mistake about the concept of an oncogene? - Answers Genes do not evolve to cause cancer, oncogenes are critical genes that are associated with cancer when they mutate/malfunction What is the difference between a primary cancer cell and a metastatic cancer cell? - Answers The primary cancer cell arises in a particular tissue, the metastatic cancer cell has migrated to other sites in the body Why are tissues with rapidly dividing cells more prone to cancer? - Answers Each cell division requires replication of the cell's entire genome, this is an opportunity for replication errors to occur Which two types of cancer are the most sexually dimorphic? - Answers Breast and prostate cancer Give an example each of a cancer either high or very low survival rate - Answers Prostate (high) pancreatic (low) Do Japanese Hawaiians have colon cancer rates more similar to Hawaiians or to Japanese in Japan? - Answers Hawaiians What are three reasons that mammals are especially prone to cancers? - Answers Complex multicellularity, placental, long-lived What are two parallels between fetal tissues and cancerous tissues? - Answers Invasive tissue, remodeling of the blood vessels, immune suppression Why do tumors larger than a certain size require new blood vessels? - Answers The inner part of larger tumors cannot survive without gas exchange and nutrients What is Antagonistic Pleiotropy? - Answers Opposite effects of the same gene early and late in life What are onco-fetal antigens? - Answers Molecules that appear commonly on fetal tissues and certain cancers. What is the difference between antibodies and antigens? - Answers Antibodies are immune molecules that can target antigens (molecules that cause immune reactions) What is an antigen? - Answers A molecule that can be recognized by an antibody (immunoglobulin). What happens to the glycocalyx of cancer? - Answers It is always altered from that of healthy cells Why is "oncogene" not a very logical term? - Answers Natural selection would not favor genes that cause cancers. Oncogenes have other functions important to the organism, but if mutated or not regulated properly, they can cause, or contribute to cancer. What is meant by p53 being a guardian of the genome? - Answers p53 proteins can protect against DNA damage, hypoxia, telomere shrinkage, and oxidative stress How could a protein guard the genome? - Answers By stabilizing DNA during replication and/or recruiting DNA repair mechanisms. How is signal transduction involved in cancer? - Answers Mutations in key signaling molecules (cytoplasmic proteins) can dysregulate cell division and/or programmed cell death. Name three important behavioral factors that strongly affect cancer risk? - Answers Diet, tobacco use, and UV exposure What epigenetic modifications could influence cancer risk? - Answers DNA methylation, histone modifications, non-coding RNA What is cancer immunoediting? - Answers The process by which the body's immune system shapes cancer and leads to either elimination, equilibrium or escape (selection for variants cancer cells that escape immune defenses). What is CAR T cell therapy? - Answers Immune therapy against cancer, where the patients own T-cells are harvested, transformed outside the body to express a cancer specific receptor and then rein fused into the patient to target the cancer. What is the evidence that our ancestors were upright by over 5 million years ago? - Answers Fossil skeleton of ape-like species with skeletal adaptation to upright posture (foramen magnum, pelvic and leg bones) Name three conditions that represent costly consequeneces of bipedalism in humans - Answers Low back pain, obstetrics, hemorrhoids How do human and chimpanzee prenatal brain growth rate differ? - Answers Human brain growth rate is constant but chimpanzee brain growth rate starts slowing down mid-gestation What is cephalo-pelvic disproportion? - Answers Mismatch between head size of the baby and hip size of the mother What are the major differences between birth process in humans and the related great apes? - Answers Humans have higher variation in gestation time, much longer duration of labor, and birth is associated with much higher levels of pain What is the notion of an obstetrical dillema? - Answers The idea that human mother balance the requirement of bipedality with those of birthing a super large-headed baby What kind of adaptations to difficult birth are apparent in the newborn skull? - Answers Unfused bone plates allowing the head to change shape during very tight birth Name an advantage and downside for red meat consumption - Answers Nutritious, great source of protein and iron, negative impact on cancer and atherosclerosis What came first, increased meat consumption or the use of fire? - Answers Foraging diets were more varied lower in calories, and much richer in plant fiber What is the difference between endocannibalism and exocannibalism? - Answers The hundreds of thousands of years that our species spent living as foraging small scale communities Explain the concept of Environment of Evolutionary Adaptation - Answers The prevailing environment in the 200,000 plus years before the beginning of settlement and agriculture that shape much of human biology What is meant by the Environment of Evolutionary Adaptation EEA? - Answers The hundreds of thousands of years that our species spent living as foraging small scale communities Name three well-studied foraging societies. - Answers Khoisan, Ache and Hadza. What is the modal (most common among adults) age of death in living hunter gatherer societies - Answers 70 plus years If life expectancy is around 35 years for most hunter gatherers, how can there be substantial numbers of 70 year olds in those societies - Answers Very high infant mortality brings down life expectancy Why is Omran's concept of the earliest stage of epidemiology as one of "pestilence and famine" not necessarily correct? - Answers Because prior to agriculture in the last 10 ky low-density hunter gatherer life included: few famines, balanced nutrition, long inter-birth intervals, lower threats of widespread epidemics Explain the concept of epidemiological transition - Answers WThe shift from high mortality due to infections to death by chronic and degenerative diseases. What is meant by double burden of disease - Answers Societies where both, communicable (infectious) disease and disease caused by modern lifestyle cooccur! How could a bacterial infection transmitted by skin contact in South America have evolved into an STI like syphilis? - Answers Sexual exploitation and violence at the hands of the Spanish conquistadores could have selected for sexually transmitted variants that benefit from lesions on genitals from transmission How could TB in pre-columbine South American skeleton be more closely related to TB in seals than any other TB strains? - Answers Intense coastal hunting for seals by paleoamericans could have exposed them to this new strain How could scientists determine what caused the epidemic of Cocolitli? - Answers Ancient DNA studies of skeletons in mass graves dated to the year of the outbreak How did the Justinian plague of the 6th century, the Black plague in the 14th century and the Hongkong plague of 1890s have in common? - Answers They were all caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis How can the plague be thought of as a spill over event? - Answers The pathogen lived in wild rodent and trades with their fur led to the importation of the pathogen to trading cities around the Mediterranean Name three social consequences of the Black Death in the 14th century - Answers Break down social order, pogroms against local Jewish populations, religious upheaval How can scientists test the effect of a genetic mutation involved in immune cell activation against the plague? - Answers By testing immune cells with different genotypes with regard to their activation to plague bacteria in a dish in the lab Is infection by the plague strictly transmitted by fleas - Answers No the plague can become pneumonic, i.e. transmitted directly from one human to the next What is a haplotype in genetics? - Answers A unique combination of genetic variants (alleles) along the same string of DNA on a given chromosome. Does Neanderthal DNA in modern humans protect from or put people at higher risk fro COVID? - Answers Both, depending on which chromosome the DNA is on How can scientists get information about Neanderthal microbiome - Answers By extracting ancient DNA from dental calculus of Neanderthal fossils as old as 40,000 years What is a phage? - Answers A virus that infects bacteria Which non-human species has been observed actively spreading fire? - Answers Black kites in Australia What do some Australian aboriginal cultures believe black kites taught humans - Answers Hunting with fire What are three advantages of burning landscapes - Answers Hunting is easier, travel is easier, and new grass attracts prey. What is especially precious about evidence for fire in caves - Answers One can safely rule out natural fires from lightning strikes Where can paleoclimate researchers find modified glucose from biomass fires tens of thousand of years ago? - Answers Sediment samples from ocean drill cores What can honey guide bird genetics teach us about human fire use? - Answers The ancient divergence between bird lineages that do or do not interact with humans, point to the deep age of fire use by humans Why do certain plants make nicotine? - Answers It is a natural pesticide against insect herbivores How could a natural pesticide made by plants cause addiction in humans? - Answers Nicotine "hacks the brain" where it interacts with special receptors. Nicotine use rapidly creates addiction as the brain habituates to this effect and starts feeling bad if nicotine is not provided. What PR trick was used to widen the tobacco market after WWI? - Answers Smoking was heavily advertised to women How would cigarette smoke harm a child before it is born? - Answers Compounds from cigarette smoke can harm placental function, it can make it into the bloodstream of the fetus and harm brain development and cause alteration of chromatin. How can Beirut, Lebanon have such higher levels of medium sized particle pollution in the air in Los Angeles, US - Answers Many more diesel engines and much less stringent air quality control laws What are the three smokes - Answers Biomass burning, Tobacco, air pollution by industry and traffic. What is anthracosis? - Answers Black lung disease/soot accumulation in lungs. How could food preparation contribute to disease risk? - Answers Smoke from indoor stoves or fireplaces and cooking, frying, and baking can generate it What are the parallels between Maillard reaction products and advanced glycation end products (AGE) - Answers Both are products of reactions between sugars and proteins Why are PAH mutagenic/carcinogenic? - Answers These multi-ringed molecules react with DNA which can cause mutations during DNA replication. What are the effects of poly aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) on brain anatomy in humans? - Answers