1. Study the passage and data below and then answer the questions that follow.

Grazing in the Serengeti grassland

The Serengeti is a huge area of tropical grassland in Tanzania. Herds of grazing mammals, such
as wildebeest, gazelle and zebra, roam freely. Every year, these herds migrate across the
Serengeti, in search of fresh grassland. The grazing mammals affect the primary productivity of
the grassland. Long-term research has found that the rate of primary production is linked to
both the rainfall and the numbers of grazing mammals.

Figure 1 Figure 2
Map of Africa showing A wildebeast, one of the many
the location of the Serengeti types of grazing mammal found
in the Serengeti

Grazing can increase the growth rate of many grass species. This is called compensatory
growth. The grazing mammals remove the upper parts of the grass leaves and this increases the
amount of light reaching the rest of the plant. The smaller leaf area reduces transpiration and
this decreases the uptake of water by the roots. Researchers investigated compensatory growth
of grasses in a region of the Serengeti. They fenced off several areas to prevent mammals from
grazing the grass. During the annual migration, thousands of wildebeest moved into the study
region where they grazed intensively for 4 days and then moved on. The researchers recorded
the changes in the fresh biomass of the grasses in the grazed and ungrazed areas over the next
32 days (Figure 3). A further investigation studied the effect of grazing intensity on primary
productivity (Figure 4).
 Figure 3

Table showing the fresh biomass over a 32 day period on grazed and ungrazed grassland.
Day I is the first day after the wildebeest moved on.

Fresh biomass / g m –2
Day
Grazed Ungrazed

1 50 430

8 55 420

16 100 380

24 120 350

32 200 300

Figure 4

Graph to show the effect of grazing intensity

on the primary productivity of Serengeti grassland

Productivity / g m –2 year –1
900

800

700

600

500

400

300

200

100

0
0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8
Grazing intensity / arbitrary units
(a) Define the terms biomass and productivity.

Biomass

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Productivity

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(2)

(b) (i) Using the data in Figure 3, calculate the mean rate of change of fresh biomass per
day, for both the grazed and ungrazed grassland, between days 1 and 32. Show
your working.

Grazed grassland.........................................

Ungrazed grassland.....................................
(4)

(ii) Suggest why the fresh biomass of grass in the ungrazed area decreased.

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(3)
(c) Study the information provided in Figure 4

(i) What is the optimum grazing intensity for Serengeti grassland?

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(1)

(ii) Suggest reasons for the very low levels of primary productivity at the highest
grazing intensity (0.8 arbitrary units).

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(3)

(d) In the Serengeti, lions are the top consumers. Suggest and explain how a fall in the
number of lions could affect the Serengeti food chain and grassland productivity.

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(3)
 (e) The grazing mammals have an important role to play in the recycling of nutrients on the
grassland. Their dung is rich in organic nitrogen-containing compounds. Describe how
these compounds are converted to nitrates.

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(4)
(Total 20 marks)

2. Scientists estimate that the atmosphere holds 755 gigatonnes (Gt) of carbon, mostly as carbon
dioxide. This value is increasing each year as a result of human activities, such as the burning of
fossil fuels and of timber. The diagram below shows a simplified ―balance sheet‖ of the carbon
cycle for one year.

93 Gt
5.5 Gt
Burning of Atmospheric Oceanic
fossil fuels 0.1 Gt carbon (755 Gt) processes

Volcanic 90 Gt
eruptions
1.6 Gt 120 Gt
Burning Respiration 121 Gt
of timber

Photosynthesis
(a) Calculate the increase in atmospheric carbon during this year. Show your working.

Answer ..............................................................
(3)

(b) Describe and explain how carbon can be removed from the terrestrial (land based) part of
the cycle for long lengths of time.

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(4)
 (c) By reference to the information in the cycle, suggest reasons for the net effect of oceanic
processes on the carbon content of the atmosphere.

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(4)

(d) Suggest how the quantities of carbon dioxide released by the combustion of fossil fuels
could be reduced.

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(3)
(Total 14 marks)

3. (a) Explain what is meant by the term antibiotic.

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(2)
 (b) Describe the effect of penicillin on bacterial growth.

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(3)
(Total 5 marks)

4. (a) Describe how tuberculosis (TB) is caused

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(3)

(b) Describe how this disease is treated.

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(2)
(Total 5 marks)
5. The flow chart summarises the response of lymphocytes in- the blood to a bacterial infection.

Bacterium enters bloodstream

Bacterium detected by lymphocytes

Clothing of lymphocytes by mitosis

Plasma cells Memory cells

secrete antibody remain in lymph nodes

(a) Explain what is meant by the term antibody.

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(1)

(b) Suggest why the cloning of lymphocytes by mitosis is important in the production of
an antibody.

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(2)
 (c) The process shown in the flow chart would lead to active immunity Explain how active
immunity differs from passive immunity.

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(3)
(Total 6 marks)

6. Photosynthesis is a complex metabolic process which can be influenced by many different

environmental factors.

(a) Explain the term limiting factor with reference to photosynthesis.

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(2)

(b) An investigation into the effect of light intensity and carbon dioxide concentration on
photosynthesis was carried out using pond weed. The pond weed was placed in a test tube
that contained pond water and a quantity of sodium hydrogencarbonate. The light was
provided by a lamp. The oxygen bubbles produced by the pond weed were directed into a
length of capillary tubing.
 The graph below shows how the rate of oxygen production of the pond weed changed
with light intensity when immersed in two different concentrations of sodium
hydrogencarbonate.

0.8

0.7 0.5 mol dm –3 sodium

hydrogencarbonate
Rate of oxygen
production 0.6
/ cm 3 min –1
0.5

0.4
0.1 mol dm –3 sodium
0.3 hydrogencarbonate

0.2

0.1

0
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400
Light intensity / arbitrary units

(i) Explain the shape of the graph between a light intensity of 0 and 400 arbitrary
units in the sodium hydrogencarbonate concentration of 0.5 mol dm–3.

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(4)
 (ii) Describe and explain the effect of increasing the concentration of sodium
hydrogencarbonate, on the rate of oxygen production.

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(3)

(iii) A number of precautions would need to be taken while carrying out this
investigation in order to obtain reliable data. Describe one precaution and explain
why this precaution is necessary.

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(2)

(c) During the light-dependent stage of photosynthesis, oxygen is produced by photolysis.

Describe the process of photolysis and explain its role.

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(3)
(Total 14 marks)
7. (a) Explain the term net primary production.

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(2)

(b) An area of deciduous forest in North America was destroyed by fire in order to create
new farmland. Within a few years the land was abandoned. The graph below shows the
change in the net primary production of the land and plant biomass over a period of
160 years, from the time the farmland was abandoned.

Net primary 40
production Plant biomass
/ kg dry mass Plant biomass
35 / kg dry mass m –2
m –2 year –1
Net primary
1.2 production 30

1.0 25

0.8 20

0.6 15

0.4 10

0.2 5

0 0
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160
Time / years
(i) Once the land was abandoned, succession took place. Describe the changes that
you would have expected to occur over the 160 years.

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(3)

(ii) Calculate the percentage increase in biomass between 40 and 100 years.
Show your working.

Answer ……………………
(1)

(iii) The units of plant biomass are kg dry mass m–2. Explain why it would be more
informative to have determined the energy content of the plants.

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(2)
 (iv) Suggest why the biomass continued to increase over the 160 year period but the net
primary production levelled off after 40 years.

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(3)
(Total 11 marks)

8. The diagram below shows the structure of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).

Phospholipid
bilayer

Nucleic acid

Enzyme

(a) Explain what is meant by the term latency with reference to HIV infection.

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(2)
 (b) Name the enzyme found in this virus

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(1)

(c) Describe the role of this enzyme in latency

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(2)
(Total 5 marks)

9. (a) Explain the meaning of the term antibiotic.

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(2)

(b) An experiment was performed to study the effect of the antibiotic penicillin on the growth
of two species of bacteria: Lactobacillus bulgaricus and Escherichia coli.

Each bacterial species was cultured in a flask containing 20 cm3 of liquid medium
and penicillin.

Control cultures without penicillin were also set up. At the start of the experiment each
flask contained 1 × 106 bacterial cells per cm3 of culture medium.
 At intervals of two hours, the number of bacterial cells in each culture was determined.
The results are shown in the graph below.

E. coli +
14
penicillin

13
E. coli only
12
Log 10 number of bacteria per cm3 culture

L. bulgaricus
11 only

10

5 L. bulgaricus +
penicillin
4

3
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24
Time / hours

(i) Compare the growth of the control cultures of E. coli and L. bulgaricus over the
24 hour period.

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(3)
 (ii) Describe and explain the effect of penicillin on the growth of L. bulgaricus.

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(4)
(Total 9 marks)

10. (a) The rate of photosynthesis can be limited by a number of factors.

Explain why temperature can be a limiting factor in photosynthesis.

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(2)

(b) The diagram below shows the structure of a chloroplast.

 Name the parts labelled A, B and C.

A …………………………………………….………………………………………

B …………………………………………….………………………………………

C …………………………………………….………………………………………
(2)

(c) The flow diagram below shows some of the processes which occur in the light
independent reaction of photosynthesis.

5 carbon compound + X

Regeneration Y
NADPH + H +
ATP

Triose phosphate

Glucose phosphate

(i) Name the substances represented by the letters X and Y.

X ..…………………………………….………………………………………

Y ..…………………………………….………………………………………
(2)

(ii) State the origin of the NADPH + H+ and the ATP used in the light-independent
reaction.

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(1)
 (d) Describe how the products of photosynthesis are transported in the plant.

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(5)
(Total 12 marks)

11. It is possible to investigate the genes present in an embryo by removing a cell and testing its
DNA.

(a) Describe how a gene probe can be used to show the presence of a mutation such as one
associated with cystic fibrosis.

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(2)
 (b) Suggest ways in which this type of genetic screening of an embryo could benefit parents
where both are known to carry a cystic fibrosis (CF) allele.

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(2)

(c) Embryonic cells homozygous for the CF allele could be modified by introducing the
normal allele before implantation of the embryo into the uterus. Explain why this
treatment might provide a long term cure for the disease.

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(2)
(Total 6 marks)

12. Children are vaccinated against a number of diseases. A vaccine contains disease-causing
organisms which have been made harmless but which act as antigens. In order to achieve full
protection, it is often necessary to give two injections of a vaccine.

The graph below shows the change in the level of antibodies in the body following two
injections of a vaccine against a disease.

6
5
Antibody level 4
/ arbitrary units 3
2
1
0
0 2 4 6 8 10
Time / weeks

First Second
injection injection
(a) (i) Compare the changes in the level of antibodies in the body following the first and
second injections of the vaccine.

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(3)

(ii) Explain how vaccination can bring about an increase in the level of antibodies.

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(3)

(b) Explain how passive immunity differs from active immunity.

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(3)
 (c) Antibodies are just one of the many types of protein found in blood plasma. The table
below shows the protein content of lymph, tissue fluid and blood plasma.

Protein content/g dm–3

Lymph 26
Tissue fluid 19
Blood plasma 69

Compare the protein content of lymph with that of tissue fluid and blood plasma and
suggest a reason for the differences.

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(2)
(Total 11 marks)

13. The diagram below shows an outline of the light-independent stage of photosynthesis, together
with some of the products.

CO 2

X Y

Note
Triose phosphate is also
known as GALP or PGAL
Triose
phosphate

Phosphorylated 6C sugar

Glucose Sucrose
(a) Using the information provided in the diagram, identify substances X and Y and state the
number of carbon atoms present in each.

X ........................................................................................................................................

Y .....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Explain how substance Y is converted to triose phosphate.

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(2)
 (c) Triose phosphate is converted to a phosphorylated 6-carbon sugar which in turn can be
converted to a number of products such as sucrose and glucose. Sucrose is translocated
around the plant in phloem.

Describe how phloem tissue is adapted for this function.

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(6)
(Total 10 marks)

14. (a) Define each of the following terms.

Biomass

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Abiotic factor

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(2)
(b) A traditional form of management in woodlands is coppicing. The diagram below shows
the structure of a coppiced woodland. The area of woodland marked A was coppiced the
previous year. The area marked B was coppiced five years before.

(i) Using the information provided in the diagram, describe the similarities and
differences between the two areas of woodland.

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(2)
 (ii) Suggest how the differences you have described in (b) (i) would affect the abiotic
factors in these two areas of woodland.

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(3)

(c) After coppicing, the biomass of the coppiced shrubs increases as they regrow. The graph
below shows how the biomass of the coppiced shrubs affects the biomass of the small
plants growing on the woodland floor.

2.5

2.0
Biomass
of small 1.5
plants
/ tonnes ha –1
1.0

0.5

0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60
Biomass of coppice shrubs / tonnes ha –1

Describe and explain the changes in the biomass of the small plants.

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(3)
 (d) Explain how the management of woodlands by coppicing could provide a sustainable
supply of fuel.

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(2)
(Total 12 marks)

15. DNA fingerprinting can be used to test the possibility of a man being the father of certain
children.

The diagram below shows the DNA fingerprints of a mother (P) and her two sons (S1 and S2).
The DNA fingerprint of the man (Q), whom the mother claimed to be the father of the two boys,
is also shown.

P S1 S2 Q
 (a) Explain what the DNA fingerprints indicate about the possible relationship of the man to
the two boys.

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(3)

(b) Explain why the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is often used in DNA fingerprinting.

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(2)
(Total 5 marks)

16. The table below shows the size of the populations, and the numbers and percentages of the
population that are infected with HIV, in five southern African countries.

Country Population Population HIV % of total % of adults % of female

(thousands) aged 15–49 infected population with HIV adults
(thousands) people with HIV aged 15–49
(thousands) with HIV
South Africa 39 900 20 982 4 200 10.5 20.0 54.8
Botswana 1 597 786 290 18.2 35.8 51.2
Namibia 1 695 795 160 19.5 53.1
Lesotho 2 108 1 000 240 23.6 54.2
Swaziland 980 468 130 13.3 25.3 51.5
 (a) Complete the table by calculating the percentage of the total population with HIV in
Namibia and Lesotho.
(1)

(b) Using the information in the table, explain the significance of the percentage of females
aged 15 to 49 who are infected with HIV.

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(2)

(c) Suggest how the structure of the population of South Africa will change in the future.
Explain your answer.

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(2)
(Total 5 marks)

17. The DNA sequencing of the gene responsible for cystic fibrosis (CF) has led to the possibility
of genetic screening to identify carriers of the disease. DNA can be extracted from cells and cut
into fragments using specific enzymes. The fragments can then be separated by gel
electrophoresis.

(a) Name the type of enzyme used to cut DNA into fragments.

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(1)
 (b) Describe how the following techniques can be used to separate the fragments of DNA and
allow the faulty gene to be identified.

Gel electrophoresis

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A gene probe

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(6)
(Total 7 marks)

18. Coral reefs are formed and maintained by very large numbers of simple animals called polyps.
These polyps have single-celled algae (simple photosynthetic organisms) living inside their
cells.

It is thought that when the sea is too warm the relationship between the coral polyps and the
algae breaks down, and the reef begins to look white (becomes bleached). If the sea temperature
falls again within a few weeks then the coral polyps and the algae reunite. If it does not, then the
coral polyps die.

In 1998, 16% of the world‘s coral reefs showed some bleaching. Half of these damaged reefs
are now recovering.

The Great Barrier Reef off the east coast of Australia has been badly bleached in the last few
years. The average sea temperature on the reef has increased by 0.3 °C in the last century. It is
feared that southern and central sections of the Great Barrier Reef are likely to be severely
affected by sea temperature rises in the next 20-40 years.
 (a) Name a method by which global sea temperatures can be monitored.

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(1)

(b) Suggest how the algae normally help the coral polyps to survive.

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(2)

(c) Some recovery in the Great Barrier Reef may be taking place at present. Suggest a
possible explanation for this, other than change in sea temperature.

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(2)
(Total 5 marks)

19. The possible effects of global warming on the growth of Arctic shrubs were investigated using
small portable greenhouses in which dwarf birch trees were grown.

(a) Suggest three factors, other than temperature, which would be affected by enclosing a
plot of land inside one of these greenhouses.

1 ..................................................................................................................................

2 ..................................................................................................................................

3 ..................................................................................................................................
(3)
(b) The diagram below shows the wood of one of the dwarf birch trees used in the
experiment, as seen in transverse section under a microscope. Inorganic ions (fertiliser)
were added to the soil while the tree was growing. The white arrows indicate the wood
that was formed just before the fertiliser was added.

(i) Name the method by which tree rings can be used to make deductions about the
climate in the past.

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(1)

(ii) Describe the change in growth following the addition of the fertiliser.

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(2)
(c) Describe a technique which could be used to provide evidence that dwarf birch became
more abundant 9000 years ago during an earlier period of global warming.

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(2)

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(d) Explain why a large increase in growth of trees may help to reduce the amount of global
warming in future.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(e) Explain why an increase in the temperature of the soil (such as that due to global
warming) would affect the decay of plant material in Arctic soils.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 12 marks)
20. The graph below shows changes in the biomass of trees during 240 years at a site undergoing
primary succession. Biomass was measured in tonnes per hectare (tonnes ha–1).

350 –

300 –
Biomass /
tonnes ha
250 –
Hemlock spruce
200 – Spruce

150 – Willow
Alder
100 –

50 –

0–
0 40 80 120 160 200 240
Time since succession began / years

(a) Using the information in the graph, explain the meaning of the term succession.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Describe the changes in the total biomass of the trees between 0 and 240 years.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
 (c) Suggest why hemlock spruce is not present until 160 years after the start of the
succession.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 7 marks)

21. (a) Describe a technique for determining the abundance of a named organism in a habitat that
you have studied.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(4)
(b) Mussels are animals found on rocky seashores. They are enclosed in two hard shells that
can be clamped together very tightly. Adult mussels attach themselves firmly to the rocks
and do not move around.

Ecoscene/Kevin King
A study was carried out to investigate the distribution of mussels on a rocky shore that
has a freshwater stream running across it into the sea. The sea level rises and falls twice
every day, between low water level A and high water level B. The sketch map below
shows the shore between the low water level and the high water level, the freshwater
stream and the six sites where the adult mussels were sampled.

The numbers of mussels found at each of the sites are shown in the table below.

Site 1 2 3 4 5 6
Number of
3 5 15 22 20 2
mussels

(i) Describe how the freshwater stream affects the distribution of the mussels.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(ii) Suggest two possible reasons for this distribution.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(c) Mussels are preyed upon by marine snails called dog whelks. A dog whelk crawls on to a
mussel and takes one or two days to make a hole in the shell before it can eat the mussel
inside.

Life size

Ecoscene/Chinch Gryniewicz

The numbers of dog whelks found at each of the sites are shown in the table below.

Site 1 2 3 4 5 6
Number of 7 8 1 0 0 4
dog whelks

Suggest how the abiotic and biotic factors referred to in this question determine the
distribution of the dog whelks on this seashore.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
(Total 11 marks)
22. Measurements were made of the rate of energy flow in an ecosystem. The results are shown in
the table below.

Energy/ kJ m–2 yr–1

Energy fixed by
photosynthesis 1.9 × 104

Energy used in plant

respiration 1.1 × 104

Energy in new biomass of

primary consumers 0.1 × 104

(a) (i) Calculate the net primary productivity in this ecosystem. Show your working.

Answer ...............................
(2)

(ii) Use the information in the table and your answer from (a)(i) to calculate the
percentage efficiency of energy transfer from the plants to the primary consumers.
Show your working.

Answer ...............................
(2)
 (b) Give two reasons why not all of the energy fixed by the plants can be used to form
biomass in the consumers.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 6 marks)

23. The following extract describes the discovery of a human body buried in a garden in Cardiff in
1989:

‗The body had lain undisturbed for eight years, and when it was discovered only the
skeleton and some hair remained. Initial examinations indicated that the remains were
those of a female aged around 15 years. There were no other clues to her identity or
appearance.‘

(a) Explain why dental records would be most useful in making an initial identification in
this case.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) Suggest how it might be possible to identify these remains by using the hair.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
 (c) Give characteristics of a corpse that could help to estimate the time of death if the body
had been discovered within a week of dying.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 6 marks)

24. A person suspected of being exposed to the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) may have
their blood tested to check for infection. Some tests determine whether antibodies which act
against the virus proteins are present in the blood.

(a) Explain how the presence of HIV proteins in the body results in the production of specific
antibodies.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(4)
(b) The graph below shows the change in the numbers of T helper cells in a person infected
Leave with HIV.

900 –

800 –

T helper cells 700 –

/ number per
mm blood 600 –

500 –

400 –

300 –

200 –

100 –

0–
–

–
–
–

–
–
–

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
Time since infection / years

T helper cells are needed for all immune responses. Fewer than 200 cells per mm3
prevents an effective immune response.

Use the information in the graph to describe how HIV infection is likely to affect this
individual‘s health.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(4)
(Total 8 marks)
25. Wiithin Lake Washington, two distinct populations of salmon are evolving. The populations
live in different areas of the lake and breed at different times of the year.

(a) Explain why there is likely to be little transfer of genes between the two populations.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) Explain how natural selection could result in the two populations becoming separate
species. You should answer this question in continuous prose.

(Allow one lined page).

(7)

(c) Suggest reasons why some people might not accept that species have arisen by the
process of evolution.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 10 marks)
26. The digestive processes of ruminant animals produce the gases methane and carbon dioxide. A
study was carried out in Virginia, USA, to determine the methane and carbon dioxide emissions
from cattle and sheep. The results of this study are shown in Figure 1 below.

Figure 1 – Table showing the emissions of methane and carbon dioxide

from cattle and sheep in 1990 and 1996.

Methane emissions Carbon dioxide

/tonnes year–1 emissions/tonnes year–1
1990 1996 1990 1996
Beef cattle 45 897 52 626 126 217 144 723
Dairy cattle 11 537 10 108 31 727 29 144
Sheep 976 672 2 628 1 848
Total 58 410 63 406 160 572 175 715
% Increase — 8.6 —

Both methane and carbon dioxide are greenhouse gases. Greenhouse gases vary in their
potential warming effect. Figure 2 shows the global warming potential (GWP) of greenhouse
gases relative to carbon dioxide.

Figure 2 – Table comparing the global warming potential of four greenhouse gases.

Greenhouse gas Global Warming Potential (GWP)

Carbon dioxide 1
Methane 21
Nitrous oxide 206
CFC-11 3400
The percentage contribution of the different greenhouse gases to global warming has changed
since 1880. These changes are shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3 – Pie charts showing the percentage contribution of different greenhouse

gases to global warming.

(a) 1880 – 1979 (b) 1980 – 1989

Other Other
Nitrous
oxides Nitrous
CFCs oxides

Carbon
CFCs dioxide
Methane

Carbon Methane
dioxide

(a) Describe how cellulose in grass is digested in a ruminant animal.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………
(3)

(b) Using the data in Figure 1, calculate the percentage increase in the carbon dioxide
emissions between 1990 and 1996. Show your working.

Answer ..............................
(2)
(c) Describe the changes in the emissions of methane and carbon dioxide between 1990 and
1996 as shown in Figure 1. Suggest reasons for these changes.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………
(3)

(d) The digestive processes of ruminant animals are not the only sources of methane and
carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. State one other source of each of these gases in the
atmosphere.

Methane ........................................................................................................................

Carbon dioxide .............................................................................................................

(2)

(e) Explain the importance of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and explain how a change
in the concentration of these gases can lead to global warming.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………
(3)
(f) Using the information provided in Figure 2, explain how an increase in methane
concentration in the atmosphere can have more effect than the same increase in carbon
dioxide concentration.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………
(2)

(g) Carbon dioxide emissions increased after 1980.

(i) Explain why the percentage contribution of carbon dioxide to global warming
decreased as shown in Figure 3.

………………………………………………………………………………………

………………………………………………………………………………………
(1)

(ii) Explain how human activities could have been responsible for the changes since
1980 in methane, CFCs and nitrous oxides, as shown in Figure 3.

………………………………………………………………………………………

………………………………………………………………………………………

………………………………………………………………………………………

………………………………………………………………………………………

………………………………………………………………………………………

………………………………………………………………………………………
(3)
(Total 19 marks)
27. (a) Explain why penicillin is classed as an antibiotic.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………
(2)

(b) Explain what is meant by the term antibiotic resistance.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………
(2)

(c) Give two factors which have contributed to the spread of antibiotic resistance.

1 .........................................................................................................................................

............................................................................................................................................

2 .........................................................................................................................................

............................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 6 marks)

28. (a) Explain the meaning of the term speciation.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………
(2)
 (b) Using suitable examples, explain how sympatric speciation differs from allopatric
speciation.

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……………………………………………………………………………………………
(4)
(Total 6 marks)

29. There is widespread concern about the possible effects of human activities on global warming.

(a) State two sources of evidence that global warming has been increasing over the past 150
years.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(b) Dinosaurs became extinct about 65 million years ago, possibly because of climate change
resulting from the impact of a meteorite with the Earth.

(i) Suggest how this impact might have caused the extinction of the dinosaurs.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(3)

(ii) Give one alternative explanation that has been proposed by reputable biologists to
explain the mass extinction of the dinosaurs.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) Climate change could mean extinction for many of Britain‘s rare species of plants and
animals.

Suggest how rare species which do not become extinct may be affected by global
warming.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
 (d) Recent global warming might be the result of an increase in greenhouse gases in the
atmosphere, related to the burning of fossil fuels by human activity since the Industrial
Revolution.

(i) Name two greenhouse gases other than carbon dioxide.

1 ........................................................................................................................

2 ........................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Give one explanation for recent global warming other than burning fossil fuel.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)
(Total 11 marks)

30. (a) Explain the meaning of the term pathogen.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Explain how each of the following reduces the chances of pathogens causing disease.

(i) Inflammation

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(3)
 (ii) Lysozyme

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(iii) Interferon

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)
(Total 8 marks)

31. Two people were found dead early one morning. A man was found on his kitchen floor, and his
wife was found in bed under the blankets. The police initially assumed that both had been
murdered at the same time, and called a forensic scientist to confirm the times of death. He
noticed that maggots of the blowfly were present on both corpses, but that they were noticeably
bigger on the woman‘s corpse, and he was able to estimate the time since the maggots had
hatched.

The table below summarises some of the data he collected.

Observation Man‘s body Woman‘s body

Air temperature around corpse / °C 10 15
Temperature of corpse / °C 10 15
Hours since blowfly eggs hatched 20 60

(a) Explain two other observations that could have been recorded to help to determine the
time of death.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) The graph below shows the effect of temperature on the time taken for blowfly larvae to
 hatch from eggs.

250 –
Time taken to
hatch / hours 200 –

150 –

100 –

50 –

0–

–
–

–
–

–
–
–
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Temperature / ºC

Explain how the evidence collected at the scene and the information in the graph could
support the theory that both people died at the same time.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)

(c) Other insects, such as beetles, are known to be involved in the decomposition of human
bodies. Suggest a reason why no beetles were found on these bodies.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 7 marks)
32. Dangerous blood clots in arteries, such as coronary arteries, can be dissolved by injecting
streptokinase into the bloodstream. Streptokinase is an enzyme that rapidly digests blood clots.
It is produced by bacteria and can be used as a treatment for patients with blocked arteries. The
first treatment with streptokinase is much more effective than a second treatment. The graph
below shows the concentration of anti-streptokinase antibodies in the blood following the first
injection of streptokinase, and when streptokinase is injected again ten weeks later.

14 –

12 –

Anti-streptokinase 10 –
antibodies / arbitrary units
8–
Second injection
6–

4–

2– First injection

0–
–

–
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
Time since injection / weeks

(a) Streptokinase acts as an antigen when injected into the blood. Explain what is meant by
an antigen.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(b) (i) With reference to the graph, compare the effects of the first and second injections
on the concentration of antibodies in the blood over the first four weeks after
injection.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(3)

(ii) Explain the differences in the immune responses to the first and the second
injections.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(4)

(c) Suggest why the manufacturers of streptokinase recommend that it should not be used to
treat a second blood clot in the same patient soon after the first treatment.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
 (d) State why the injection of a different enzyme would not be affected by the response to
streptokinase.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
(Total 12 marks)

33. The diagram below shows one pair of electrons being passed between the molecules of the
electron carrier system (A, B, C and D) during part of the light-dependent reactions of
photosynthesis.

(a) (i) Explain how the pair of electrons move from chlorophyll to the electron carrier
system.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(ii) Explain how electrons lost from chlorophyll are replaced.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(iii) Explain how ATP is synthesised when electrons pass between electron carriers B
and C.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(b) Describe the Calvin cycle. You should answer this question in continuous prose.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................
(6)
(Total 12 marks)
34. A student investigated the decomposition of leaves from a sweet chestnut tree. In November
1988, she placed an equal number of leaves in nylon bags with three different mesh sizes. The
bags were then buried in garden soil. A fourth sample was placed in a mesh bag and suspended
in the air. She examined the bags at intervals of six months and made estimates of the
percentage of leaves that remained before reburying the bags. Her results are shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1 – The percentage of sweet chestnut leaves remaining in nylon bags of differing
mesh size over a period of two and a half years.

Percentage of sweet chestnut leaves remaining in the bags

November May November May November May
Sample 1988 1989 1989 1990 1990 1991
0.05 mm mesh
100 62 60 51 42 38
bag in soil
1 mm mesh
100 62 38 30 30 29
bag in soil
5 mm mesh
100 33 10 10 10 10
bag in soil
0.05 mm mesh
100 96 92 88 84 80
bag in air

In another investigation, the nitrogen content of leaves from six species of tree was measured.
Some fresh leaves from these trees were then placed in separate nylon bags with a 5 mm mesh
and buried in garden soil in July. The bags were examined after four months and the percentage
of the leaves remaining was recorded. The results of this investigation are shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2 – A scattergraph showing the relationship between the percentage of leaves

remaining after four months and the nitrogen content of the leaves.

100
90 Cherry
80 Pine
Percentage 70 Birch Sweet Chestnut Sycamore
of leaves 60
remaining after 50
Oak
four months
40
30
20
10
0
0 0.5 1 1.5 2
Nitrogen content of leaves / %
(a) (i) Using the information in Figure 1, compare the breakdown of the sweet chestnut
leaves in the four bags between November 1988 and May 1991.

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................
(4)

(ii) Suggest an explanation for the differences that you have described in (a)(i).

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Using the information in Figure 2, describe the relationship between the nitrogen content
of the leaves and the decomposition of the leaves. Suggest a reason for this relationship.

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................
(2)
 (c) Coniferous forests in Northern Europe have long cold winters and short warm summers.
Tropical rain forests are found in the hot and wet regions of the world. Coniferous forests
have a thick layer of pine needles (leaves) lying on the forest floor. Tropical rain forests
have relatively few leaves lying on the forest floor. Suggest reasons for this difference.

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................
(3)

(d) The organic nitrogen in fallen leaves is eventually converted into nitrates. Describe the
role of soil microorganisms in this process.

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................
(3)
(Total 14 marks)

35. (a) Explain what is meant by the term infection.

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................
(2)
 (b) Tuberculosis is a disease caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis. The
disease is caught when secretions from the lungs and airways of an infected person are
inhaled and the bacteria pass down to the lungs. Tuberculosis is characterised by
persistent coughing with blood-stained mucus.

Tuberculosis can be treated with antibiotics. Patients need to be given three or four
different antibiotics (combination therapy) for several months. It is important that the
drugs are taken every single day and that the medication continues to be taken even after
the patient feels better, to prevent the development of antibiotic resistance.

(i) With reference to the effect of M. tuberculosis on lung tissue, suggest how the
bacteria cause the coughing of blood-stained mucus.

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Explain how antibiotic resistance develops.

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 6 marks)

36. (a) Distinguish between the terms active immunity and passive immunity.

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................
(3)
 (b) Describe the causes of pneumoconiosis.

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................
(3)
(Total 6 marks)

37. (a) Harmful bacteria are often present on the skin surface.

Explain why these bacteria do not normally enter the body.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(b) The photograph below shows human skin which has been damaged by a cut.

Dr. P. Marazzi/Science Photo Library

Give two responses within the damaged skin which help to prevent bacteria entering the
body.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 4 marks)
38. The pedigree (family tree) of every racehorse in the UK can be traced back to three male horses
imported in the early 1700s. Strict rules that control breeding programmes ensure that every
racehorse has its parents listed in a stud book.

(a) Describe the likely effect of these breeding programmes on the genetic diversity of
racehorses.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) The use of DNA fingerprinting techniques, similar to those used for identifying people,
has shown that mistakes have been made in the stud book.

Give one reason why DNA fingerprinting is likely to produce a more accurate record of
the pedigree of a racehorse than the stud book.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
 (c) It is easier to identify humans using DNA fingerprinting than racehorses. Suggest a
reason for this.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 5 marks)

39. Simazine is a herbicide that kills plants by disrupting the flow of electrons in the membranes of
chloroplasts.

An investigation was carried out into the effects of Simazine on photosynthesis. Two samples of
plants were grown under the same controlled conditions. One sample was treated with water and
the other with a solution of Simazine. Both samples were supplied with radioactive carbon
dioxide (14CO2) in a well lit, sealed chamber for an hour.

The plants were removed from the chamber and killed immediately. The mass of radioactive
carbon fixed in the plants was measured.

(a) Suggest one condition which should have been controlled while the plants were growing.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) Explain why the plants were killed immediately after they were removed from the
chamber.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
(c) The results of the experiment are given in the table below.

Radioactive carbon fixed / mg

Plants treated with water Plants treated with Simazine
10.6 1.4

Suggest an explanation for the effect of Simazine on the mass of radioactive carbon fixed
in the plants.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(5)
(Total 7 marks)
40. Extracts from the bark of a South American tree have been used as a treatment for tooth decay
for many years. To test whether the extract could be an effective antibiotic, the growth of
Mycobacterium tuberculosis in the presence of the extract was studied.

(a) Describe a technique that you could use to measure the effects of an antibiotic on the
growth of bacteria.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(5)

(b) Explain why there is a need to continue searching for new antibiotics.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) Suggest a reason for testing the effect of the extract on mammalian cells.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
(d) The study involved counting the number of living Mycobacterium cells after growth in a
range of concentrations of the extract. The results are shown in the graph below.

Living
Mycobacterium
tuberculosis
/ cells m 3

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
3
Concentration of extract / mg dm

In order to compare the effectiveness of the extract with other antibiotics, the minimum
inhibitory concentration (MIC) was calculated. This is the minimum concentration that
will reduce bacterial growth by 90%.

(i) Use the information in the graph to find the MIC for this extract. Show your
working.

Answer ............................
(2)
 (ii) Explain why this extract would not make an effective antibiotic against
Mycobacterium.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 12 marks)

41. The diagram below shows a simplified carbon cycle.

(a) Each box represents a process. Write the name of the process in each of the boxes A, B, C
and D.
(2)
(b) With reference to an example, explain what is meant by the term carbon sink.

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) (i) The increase in the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has been
linked to global warming. Explain what is meant by the term global warming.

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................

................................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Name two gases, other than carbon dioxide, which are thought to contribute to
global warming.

1. ............................................................................................................................

2. ............................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 8 marks)
42. The diagram below shows the possibility of developing tuberculosis (TB) when people are
exposed to the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

(a) Name the organ which is the most commonly infected by M. tuberculosis.

......................................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) Suggest why 90% of people who are infected by M. tuberculosis never develop TB.

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................
(2)
 (c) Outline the treatment for those people with active TB.

.......................................................................................................................................

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.......................................................................................................................................
(3)
(Total 6 marks)

43. The flow diagram below summarises some of the stages used to copy DNA in the polymerase
chain reaction (PCR).
(a) Explain why the DNA is heated during Stage 1.

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Describe the structure of the primers used in Stage 2 and explain why they are used.

.......................................................................................................................................

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.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................
(3)

(c) Another method of producing many copies of a DNA sample is to introduce the DNA
into bacteria and allow them to reproduce. Suggest one disadvantage of this technique
compared with PCR.

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................
(1)
(Total 6 marks)
44. The Isthmus of Panama is a strip of land that separates the Pacific Ocean from the Atlantic
Ocean in Central America. The map below shows the Isthmus of Panama.

The pictures below show two species of fish known as wrasse.

Blue-headed wrasse (Thallassoma bifasciatum)

Rainbow wrasse (Thallassoma lucasanum)

The blue-headed wrasse is found in the coral reefs on the Atlantic side of the isthmus and the
rainbow wrasse is found in the reefs on the Pacific side of the isthmus.

It has been shown that both of the species are descended from a common ancestral population
that was split as the isthmus formed.

(a) Explain why the blue-headed wrasse and the rainbow wrasse are described as different
species.

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Suggest how analysis of DNA or proteins might be used to supply additional evidence
that these species have descended from a common ancestor.

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................
(2)
 (c) Explain how the splitting of the common ancestral population into an Atlantic population
and a Pacific population have led to the formation of these two separate species.

.......................................................................................................................................

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(5)
(Total 9 marks)

45. The carbohydrates in green plants are formed during the light-independent stage of
photosynthesis. They are synthesised from glycerate 3-phosphate (GP).

(a) State precisely where the synthesis of carbohydrates takes place during the light-
independent stage of photosynthesis.

......................................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) Name the products of the light-dependent stage of photosynthesis used during the
synthesis of carbohydrates.

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................
(2)
(c) Describe the role of ribulose bisphosphate (RuBP) in the light-independent stage of
photosynthesis.

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................

......................................................................................................................................
(2)

(d) An investigation of photosynthesis in cells taken from a green alga was carried out.
Samples of the algal cells were taken at 1 minute intervals over a period of 6 minutes.
The quantities of GP and RuBP in these cell samples were measured.

At the start of the investigation, the algal cells were kept in an atmosphere with 1%
carbon dioxide. After 3 minutes, the concentration of carbon dioxide was decreased to
0.003%.

The graph below shows the results of this investigation.

Carbon dioxide decreased

1% carbon dioxide 0.003% carbon dioxide

Quantities RuBP
of RuBP
and GP
/ arbitrary
units

GP

0 1 2 3 4 5 6
Time / minutes
 (i) Describe the effects of the decrease in the concentration of carbon dioxide on the
quantities of GP and RuBP.

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Suggest explanations for the effects you have described in part (i).

...............................................................................................................................

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...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................

...............................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 9 marks)

46. Changes in the global environment are investigated using remote sensing techniques.

(a) Describe and explain what is meant by remote sensing.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
(b) Describe two kinds of data commonly collected by remote sensing which can be used by
scientists studying climate change and its effects.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) Techniques such as remote sensing have been available only in recent times.
Information from dendochronology is usually limited to the past 1000 years.

Apart from dendochronology, explain how scientists can investigate ecological changes
over the past 12 000 years.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

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(4)
(Total 9 marks)
47. The diagram below summarises the carbon cycle.

Carbon dioxide
in the atmosphere
C

B B
Decayed by
Used as a fuel microbes
in a power station
Fossil fuels A producing electricity

Plant biomass

(a) (i) Name the processes A, B and C.

A .......................................................................................................................

B .......................................................................................................................

C .......................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Suggest a type of plant biomass that is used as a source of energy in some power
stations as an alternative to fossil fuels.

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) The use of biomass is considered to be sustainable whereas using fossil fuels is not
sustainable.

(i) State the meaning of sustainable.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)
 (ii) Suggest why using plant biomass to generate electricity is thought to be more
sustainable than using fossil fuel.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(3)

(c) The diagram below shows an experiment to test the hypothesis that carbon dioxide is a
greenhouse gas.

Electrical connections

Temperature
probes

Atmospheric Air enriched with

air carbon dioxide from a
Glass bottles soda-water syphon refill

Name two pieces of equipment not shown in the diagram that you would need to
complete the experiment.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
 (d) Some scientists think that global warming will increase the rate of decay of dead biomass.

(i) Suggest why global warming might increase the rate of decay.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(ii) Explain one reason why an increase in the rate of decay might increase the rate of
global warming even more.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 12 marks)

48. The diagram below shows a bacterium.

A
B

(a) Name the four structures labelled in the diagram.

A ..................................................................................................................................

B ..................................................................................................................................

C ..................................................................................................................................

D ..................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Give three features of a virus which distinguishes it from a bacterium.

 .....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)

(c) Give two reasons for selecting some features but not others when classifying living
organisms.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 7 marks)

49. A model ecosystem was set up in an aquarium. Organisms from three trophic levels were
introduced and left until their population sizes were fairly constant.

All of the organisms were then collected and the total biomass of each species was measured.
The energy content per gram of the biomass was then measured.

The table below summarises the data collected.

Total biomass Energy content per Total energy from

collected / g gram / kJ biomass / kJ
Species A 3000 0.5 1500
Species B 80 1.5
Species C 140 0.1

(a) (i) Complete the table by calculating the total energy from biomass of species B and
C.
(1)
 (ii) Calculate the total energy from biomass for species C as a percentage of that found
for species B. Show your working.

Answer ....................................
(2)

(b) Explain how the data above support the hypothesis that species C is a secondary
consumer.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
(Total 6 marks)

50. Mycobacterium bovis is a bacterium which can be injected into the body to stimulate active
immunity against tuberculosis (TB). This is known as the BCG vaccine. TB is caused by
Mycobacterium tuberculosis, a bacterium that is closely related to M. bovis.

(a) Explain what is meant by active immunity.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(b) Describe the role of B cells in active immunity.

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.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(5)

Another common bacterium, Mycobacterium fortuitum is harmless and often found in soil. In a
study to compare the effects of different Mycobacterium species, mice were infected with
Mycobacterium as shown in the diagram opposite. Enough time was allowed between injections
for an immune response to develop.

Bacterium species Treatment A Treatment B Treatment C

injected

M. fortuitum

M. bovis

M. tuberculosis

Mouse dies of TB Mouse survives Mouse dies of TB

 (c) Explain why the mouse died of TB after treatment A, but the mouse used for treatment B
did not die of TB.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(d) The BCG vaccine needs the M. bovis cells to grow and divide in order to provide
protection. Suggest reasons why the BCG vaccine in treatment C failed to protect the
mouse against TB.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(e) M. fortuitum often infects wounds in young children. Suggest one possible consequence
of this in later life.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
(Total 12 marks)

51. A study of plant species near a sandy shore was carried out.

The table below shows some of the data collected. Sites were sampled at a range of distances
inland from a reference point on the beach

Site number 1 2 3 4 5 6
Distance from reference point / m 20 80 250 500 650 1800
Dead organic matter in soil / % 0.4 0.5 0.9 2.8 6.4 23.4
Number of plant species found 1 1 8 16 7 2

Each site represents a stage in the succession from bare sand to a climax community.
(a) (i) Describe the changes in the percentage of dead organic matter and number of plant
species as the distance from the reference point increases.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Suggest how changes in the percentage of dead organic matter in the soil could
account for the changes in the number of plant species.

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(4)
 (b) Explain what is meant by a climax community.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) Another way to study plant succession is to measure changes in the percentage cover of
plant species. Describe how you could measure percentage cover of a plant species in a
site you have studied.

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 10 marks)

52. Vancomycin is an antibiotic which has been available for many years but is rarely used.
Recently, some bacteria have been found which are resistant to vancomycin.

(a) Describe how bacteria can develop resistance to antibiotics such as vancomycin.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Explain why resistance to vancomycin has developed more slowly than resistance to
some other antibiotics.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
One way that bacteria can combat the effects of an antibiotic is to produce an enzyme that
breaks down the antibiotic molecule. A new drug called augmentin has been developed.
This drug combines vancomycin with another molecule called a bodyguard molecule.
Augmentin is an effective treatment against vancomycin resistant bacteria.

The diagram below shows the results of an experiment to demonstrate the effectiveness of
augmentin in preventing the growth of vancomycin resistant bacteria.

Paper disc with

vancomycin only

Paper disc with

augmentin Agar plate spread
(vancomycin plus with vancomycin
bodyguard molecule) resistant bacteria

Clear zone

Control Paper disk with

bodyguard
molecule only

(c) Give a suitable control for this experiment.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(d) Suggest conclusions that can be drawn from this experiment.

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(3)
 (e) Suggest how augmentin might work.

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(2)
(Total 10 marks)

53. A group of students carried out an investigation to determine the energy flow in a rainforest
food chain. They collected invertebrate animals from trees, identified them and placed them in
the appropriate trophic level.

For each trophic level the animals were counted, weighed and the energy content determined.
Using their data and other sources of information the students produced a diagram to show the
energy flow along the food chain. The diagram is shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1

Sunlight

200 × 10 3 kJ m –2 y –1
140 × 10 3 kJ m–2 y –1
Producers Respiration

7000 kJ m –2 y –1

Primary consumers

700 kJ m –2 y –1
24 × 10 3 kJ m –2 y –1
Secondary consumers Decomposers

70 kJ m –2 y –1

Tertiary consumers

Some farmers clear plots of rainforest to use for crops. The trees are felled and then burnt.
This practice is called slash and burn. The soil is left covered in ash, which is rich in nutrients.
However, the nutrients are soon used up by the growing crops. Within two or three years the
plot is abandoned and the farmer moves on to a new plot.
The abandoned plot is colonised by tree species and eventually the land is covered by secondary
rainforest. The sequence of events is shown in Figure 2. This figure also shows that the total
biomass of the rainforest trees is made up of leaves, stems and branches, roots and leaf litter.
These components of the biomass change as the rainforest is cleared, farmed and then
abandoned.

Figure 2

Primary Secondary
rainforest Farming rainforest
10 years 25 years
Slash Plot
and burn abandoned

Biomass
component
Leaves 50 10 50 50
Leaf litter 400 50 200 300
Branches 50 10 50 50
Roots 200 50 50 75

The biomass components are shown in million tonnes per hectare.

(a) Define the term net primary production (NPP).

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.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(b) (i) Explain why only a small percentage of the light energy falling onto a leaf is
converted into chemical energy.

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(2)

(ii) Explain why only 10% of the energy locked up in the secondary consumers is
transferred to the tertiary consumers.

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(3)

(c) The energy shown entering the decomposers in Figure 1, is much greater than that
entering all of the consumers. Suggest an explanation for this difference.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
(d) (i) Using Figure 2, compare the components of the biomass of the primary rainforest
with those of the secondary rainforest after 25 years.

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(3)

(ii) Using all of the information provided, suggest why slash and burn farming is
considered to be unsustainable.

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(3)
 (e) Suggest how the biodiversity of the surrounding rainforest could be changed by the
practice of slash and burn. Give reasons for your answer.

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(4)
(Total 18 marks)

54. (a) Antibiotics are used to treat bacterial infections because they target bacterial cells and not
the patient‘s cells.

Give two differences between a bacterial cell and a patient‘s cell.

1 ....................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

2 ....................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................
(2)
(b) A suspension of Gram negative bacteria (type A) was spread evenly over solid medium
in a petri dish. One hour later, four discs were placed on the surface of the medium.
Each disc had been soaked in a different antibiotic (antibiotics P, Q, R and S).

The procedure was repeated for another suspension of Gram negative bacteria (type B).

The cultures were then incubated for 48 hours.

The appearance of the cultures after incubating for 48 hours is shown below.

Bacteria type A Bacteria type B

Disc soaked in Bacterial growth

antibiotic

P P

S Q S Q

R R

Clear zone

(i) Compare the sensitivity of the two types of bacteria to the antibiotics P, Q, R
and S.

..........................................................................................................................

..........................................................................................................................

..........................................................................................................................

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..........................................................................................................................

..........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (ii) Suggest which antibiotic is penicillin, explaining the reason for your choice.

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(3)
(Total 7 marks)

55. An experiment was carried out to investigate the effect of light intensity on the rate of
photosynthesis of an aquatic plant, using the apparatus shown below.

Scale in mm

Capillary tube
Light Syringe
Gas bubbles

Aquatic plant in
perforated tube

Test tube filled

with water
(a) Explain what is meant by the term limiting factor.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) State two environmental conditions, other than light intensity, which would need to be
controlled.

Describe how each of these environmental conditions could be controlled.

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.....................................................................................................................................
(4)
(c) The aquatic plant was allowed to carry out photosynthesis for 10 minutes. Describe how
this apparatus could be used to determine the rate of oxygen production (mm3 min–1).

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.....................................................................................................................................
(4)

(d) Describe how you could modify this apparatus to determine the effect of different
wavelengths of light on photosynthesis.

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 12 marks)
56. An investigation was carried out into the effect of grazing by rabbits in an area of grassland.
In 1954 and 1957, the mean height of the vegetation was measured.

In 1956 an outbreak of a disease greatly reduced the number of rabbits.

The results are shown in the table below.

1954 1957
Mean height of vegetation/cm 2.0 11.5

(a) Describe and explain the effect of the decrease in the number of rabbits on the mean
height of the vegetation.

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.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) A grazed grassland is a plagioclimax community,

(i) Explain what is meant by the term plagioclimax.

...........................................................................................................................

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...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (ii) Describe how an area of grazed grassland could develop into a woodland
community.

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(4)
(Total 8 marks)

57. The diagram below shows some of the stages in the Calvin cycle.

CO 2

RuBP

FBPase PGA

Glucose PGAL

Sucrose
(a) Some stages of the Calvin cycle require energy from ATP. Describe in outline how ATP
is made available by reactions in the chloroplast.

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.....................................................................................................................................
(5)

FBPase is an enzyme involved in one step of the pathway used to re-form the CO2 acceptor
molecule RuBP.

In an investigation, plants were modified by introducing a gene which reduces the activity of
FBPase. The graph below shows the effect of this treatment on the sucrose content of the leaves
of treated and untreated plants.

250
200
% of normal
150
sucrose
content 100
50
0
Untreated Treated
plants plants
(b) Describe the effect of reduced FBPase activity on the sucrose content of leaves.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) Suggest an explanation for the difference in sucrose content of the leaves of treated and
untreated plants.

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.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(d) Suggest potential benefits of plants modified in this way.

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.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 11 marks)
58. Samuel Wilberforce, a bishop of Oxford in the 19th century, was a fierce critic of Darwin‘s
theory of evolution by natural selection.

(a) Explain why Wilberforce might have been so strongly opposed to the theory of evolution
by natural selection.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)

One argument that Wilberforce used was that no new species had been seen to arise. Even
breeds of dog that had been prevented from cross breeding for many generations remained the
same species. If two breeds of dog are allowed to interbreed they produce fertile offspring
showing a variety of intermediate characteristics (mongrels).

(b) Describe how interbreeding of dog breeds can result in mongrel dogs.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) Explain why Wilberforce‘s example of dog breeds does not show that Darwin‘s theory of
evolution by natural selection is incorrect.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 7 marks)
59. The hepatitis C virus (HCV) is transmitted in body fluids and infects the liver. HCV is very
common in people who also have HIV infection. One treatment for HCV infection is injections
of interferon.

(a) Explain why HCV infection is common in HIV positive people.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Name the type of cell involved in the normal immune response to virus-infected liver
cells.

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

Binding of interferon to infected cells causes an enzyme called PKR to become activated, and
this prevents protein synthesis from occurring. The diagram below shows how interferon might
be involved in the body‘s response to HCV infection.

Interferon binds to
protein on cell surface

Interferon
Inactive Active
PKR PKR
Cell surface protein
HCV
infects
Protein synthesis
cell
prevented
(c) With reference to the diagram on page 8, explain the likely effects of interferon binding
to the infected liver cell.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)

Unfortunately, this treatment is only effective in 20% of cases because many strains of HCV are
resistant to the effect of interferon. It has been found that these resistant viruses have a protein
on their coats which inhibits the enzyme PKR.

(d) Suggest a reason why these virus strains are resistant to interferon.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
 HCV can replicate in an infected person at the rate of 1017 virus particles per day.

(e) Explain why it is very difficult for drug developers to produce treatments that are
effective in the long term.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(4)
(Total 12 marks)

60. (a) The table below shows some data obtained from studies on seaweed on a rocky shore.
The species are listed in the order down the shore that they are normally found.
Seaweeds on the upper shore may be out of the sea, and exposed to the air for many days
at a time.

Some scientists suggested that seaweeds on the upper shore retain water better than
seaweeds on the lower shore.

Cell wall Water loss on Recovery of normal

thickness / drying out for metabolism after drying out
μm fixed time / % and then rewetting / %
Upper Shore Pelvetia
1.2 85 95
canaliculata
Fucus
1.47 70 49
spiralis
Fucus
0.69 80 20
vesiculosus
Fucus
0.42 83 0
serratus
Lower Shore Laminaria
0.28 88 0
(near sea) digitata
 (i) Explain why these data do not support the hypothesis that seaweed species
growing high on the shore will retain water better than seaweed species growing
lower on the shore.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Suggest an explanation, supported by the data, that could account for this
distribution of seaweeds.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(3)

The upper shore experiences a wider range of temperatures since it spends time exposed to the
air, and it can reach much higher temperatures than seawater.

Another study was carried out to investigate the effects of temperature on the activity of rocky
shore snails. The temperature at which 50% became inactive was measured for 5 species of snail
and the data are given below. The rate of water loss on exposure to the air was also measured

Littorina Littorina Littorina Littorina

Calliostoma
littorea saxatilis obtusata neritoides
Temperature
of inactivity / 46.0 45.0 34.5 44.0 46.3
°C
Water loss /
% body mass 5.35 5.6 10.1 8.35 3.7
per day
 (b) Suggest one species that you would expect to find more frequently on the upper shore,
and one species that you would expect to be limited to the lower shore, giving a reason
for each of your answers.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(4)

(c) Suggest two biotic factors that might affect the distribution of organisms in the rocky
shore studied above.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 11 marks)

61. On 26th September, a forensic scientist was called to a room where a man was found dead. She
was asked to determine the time of death.

She recorded the temperature in the room and she collected the larvae and pupae of several
species of insect from the body. She took the pupae and larvae to her laboratory, where they
were placed in a constant temperature of 23 °C.

On the 4th October, adults from four species of insect appeared, and another species appeared
on the 6th October. One of the first species to be seen was the blowfly, which can lay eggs on a
corpse within minutes of death, but which is rarely active at night.

Records of weather conditions for the area were consulted and the time of death was determined
to be 14th or 15th September.
(a) Explain the importance of the temperature data in this investigation.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Suggest one reason why collecting data about several species of insect would make the
estimate of time of death more reliable.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(c) Suggest a reason why the scientist could not be more precise as to the time of death.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 5 marks)
« t62. The periwinkle (Littorina littorea) is a small marine snail that feeds on algae (seaweeds) as
shown in Figure 1 below. It prefers to eat fast-growing, short-lived green algae such as
Enteromorpha rather than tough, long-lived red algae such as Chondrus.

Figure 1
Periwinkle (Littorina littorea) feeding on algae.

If these two algae are growing in the same rock pool, the more rapid growth of Enteromorpha
reduces the growth of Chondrus. However, periwinkles grazing on the Enteromorpha help to
keep it under control and this allows Chondrus to grow.

A study was made of the feeding preferences of the periwinkle on rocky shores and how these
affected the growth of Enteromorpha and Chondrus. An ecologist studied the percentage cover
of algae in three rock pools.

The density of periwinkles in the three rock pools was:

• Rock pool A 100 per m2

• Rock pool B 200 per m2

• Rock pool C 0 per m2

At the start of the study she removed all of the periwinkles from Rock pool B and placed them
in Rock pool C which had none. She monitored the changes in the percentage cover of algae
over a period of 28 months. Her results are shown in Figure 2. The effect of the density of the
periwinkles on the diversity of the algae was also studied. The results are shown in Figure 3.

Figure 2

Rock pool A
cover of algae (%)

100
Percentage

80 Enteromorpha
60
40 Chondrus
20
0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28
Time / months

Rock pool B
cover of algae (%)

100
Percentage

80
60
40
20
0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28
Time / months

Rock pool C
cover of algae (%)

100
Percentage

80
60
40
20
0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28
Time / months
 Figure 3

Graph showing the change in the number of algal species with the increase in the
density of periwinkles in rock pools

Number of algal species

14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
0 50 100 150 200 250 300
Density of periwinkles/
number per m 2

(a) State the terms that are used to describe the roles of the algae and periwinkles in a food
chain.

Algae ...........................................................................................................................

Periwinkles ..................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) (i) Using Figure 2, describe the percentage cover of Enteromorpha and Chondrus in
Rock pools B and C at the start of the study (Month 0).

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(ii) Describe the changes in the percentage cover of Enteromorpha in Rock pools
A, B and C.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(3)

(iii) Suggest reasons for these changes described in (b)(ii).

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(iv) Suggest a reason for the sudden fall in the percentage cover of Chondrus in rock
pool C after 18 months.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)
(c) Using Figure 3, describe and explain the effect of periwinkle density on the number of
algal species.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(d) Rock pools can be polluted by excess nutrients.

(i) Give two sources of excess nutrients.

1 ........................................................................................................................

2 ........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (ii) Describe the effect of excess nutrients on aquatic habitats.

...........................................................................................................................

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...........................................................................................................................
(4)
(Total 18 marks)

63. The diagram below shows a root hair cell.

(a) Describe how the shape of a root hair cell increases the efficiency of absorption of water
and mineral ions from the soil solution.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) Mineral ions can be taken up by root hair cells and may accumulate at higher
concentrations than in the soil solution. Explain how mineral ions are taken up by root
hair cells.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(4)
(c) Phosphate ions are required for the synthesis of many important molecules in plants.
Name two products of the light-dependent stage of photosynthesis that require phosphate
ions in their molecular structure.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(d) Describe a simple procedure by which you could use mineral culture solutions to find the
effect of a lack of phosphate ions on plant growth.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
(Total 9 marks)
64. The fox (Vulpes vulpes) is a common mammal living in both rural (country) and urban (town)
areas of the United Kingdom. Foxes eat a variety of foods including berries, rabbits, small birds
and rodents such as rats and mice.

(a) The photograph below shows the skull of the fox. Describe two features of the teeth of
this fox that are an adaptation for feeding on small mammals.

Magnification ×0.5
Source: www.nhc.ed.ac.uk

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
 (b) A number of studies have investigated the differences between the diets of rural foxes and
foxes living in urban areas. The results of one study are shown below.

60

50 Rural fox
Urban fox
40
% of diet

30

20

10

0
Other Small Human Berries Small Large
pets food rodents rodents
Food type

(i) Compare the diet of the rural fox with the diet of the urban fox.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (ii) Human food was found to have a high content of carbohydrates and fats. Suggest
how this could affect the time spent looking for food and the quantity of food eaten
by the urban foxes.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) (i) Foxes are territorial animals. Rural foxes commonly have territories between two
and six km2 (200 to 600 hectares) in size. Urban foxes have a much smaller
territory of less than 0.6 km2. Explain how this could affect the population of foxes
in urban areas.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Suggest one factor, other than food and territory size, that could affect the
population size of the urban fox.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)
 (d) It has been suggested that the teeth of the urban fox are changing as their diet changes.
Describe how the rural and urban foxes could evolve into separate species.

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................
(4)
(Total 13 marks)

65. (a) Explain what is meant by the term gross primary production (GPP).

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(b) The table below shows the flow of energy in a tropical rainforest.

Trophic level Energy entering trophic level/kJ m–2 year–1

Producers 180.0 × 103
Primary consumers 5.0 × 103
Secondary consumers 4.5 × 103
Tertiary consumers 3.4 × 103
Decomposers 28.4 × 103

(i) Energy is transferred between trophic levels. If the producers lose 145 × 103 kJ m–2
year–1 in respiration, calculate the percentage of net primary production (NPP)
which is passed to the primary consumers. Show your working.

Answer ................................ %
(3)

(ii) Explain the role of decomposers in a food chain.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (iii) The productivity of a temperate forest in Europe is much lower than that of a
tropical rainforest. Suggest reasons for this difference.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) Describe how a forest could be managed sustainably in order to ensure a continual supply
of timber for the future.

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
(Total 12 marks)
66. The fox (Vulpes vulpes) is a common mammal living in both rural (country) and urban (town)
areas of the United Kingdom. Foxes eat a variety of foods including berries, rabbits, small birds
and rodents such as rats and mice.

(a) The photograph below shows the skull of the fox. Describe two features of the teeth of
this fox that are an adaptation for feeding on small mammals.

Magnification ×0.5
Source: www.nhc.ed.ac.uk

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
 (b) A number of studies have investigated the differences between the diets of rural foxes and
foxes living in urban areas. The results of one study are shown below.

60

50 Rural fox
Urban fox
40
% of diet

30

20

10

0
Other Small Human Berries Small Large
pets food rodents rodents
Food type

(i) Compare the diet of the rural fox with the diet of the urban fox.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (ii) Human food was found to have a high content of carbohydrates and fats. Suggest
how this could affect the time spent looking for food and the quantity of food eaten
by the urban foxes.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) It has been suggested that the teeth of the urban fox are changing as their diet changes.
Describe how the rural and urban foxes could evolve into separate species.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(4)
(Total 10 marks)
67. During the last Ice Age, England was joined to France by an area of land (land bridge).
About 12 000 years ago the air temperature started to rise and the ice melted. By about 8000
years ago the rising sea levels flooded the land bridge and England became part of an island.

100 km 100 km

SCOTLAND SCOTLAND

ENGLAND ENGLAND

FRANCE FRANCE

North West Europe 12 000 years ago North West Europe 8000 years ago

As the ice melted and the climate became warmer, tree species such as pine, hazel and oak
probably spread from France across the land bridge and then, over several hundred years, spread
north to Scotland.

(a) Suggest how tree species may have spread across the land bridge and north to Scotland.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)

(b) Suggest why it took many years for these tree species to spread from France to Scotland.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(c) Using pollen analysis scientists have found that, in what we now call England, pine trees
were growing before oak trees.

(i) Explain how pollen analysis is carried out.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Explain the evidence that would show that in a particular place, pine came before
oak.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(d) Computer models can be used to predict the extent of global warming in Scotland over
the next 100 years. Explain why these predictions may be inaccurate.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
(Total 11 marks)
68. The diagram below shows energy flow measured during a study of a grassland ecosystem.
The values shown are kJ m–2 year–1 × 104. Values of energy lost through respiration (R) and
other means (L) are shown for some organisms. The biomass of the organisms in the ecosystem
remained unchanged during the study.

R=2
6
Seed eating birds

L=3.7

R=3600 R=12.5
44.4 0.07
Grasses Grasshoppers Spiders

L=25.4
1980

Other 11.6
Field mice
organisms

(a) Name one primary consumer and one secondary consumer shown in this diagram.

Primary consumer .......................................................................................................

Secondary consumer ...................................................................................................

(2)

(b) (i) Calculate the gross primary productivity (GPP) for the grasses in this system.
Show your working.

.................................... kJ m–2 year–1 × 104

(2)
 (ii) Describe how this figure could be used to calculate the net primary productivity
(NPP) of the grasses.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(c) (i) Calculate the percentage of the energy taken in by the grasshoppers that is
converted into new grasshopper biomass. Show your working.

Answer ..............................................
(3)

(ii) Give two ways in which energy is lost by the grasshoppers other than in
respiration.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(d) Use your calculated figures from parts (b)(i) and (c)(i) to explain why food chains are of
limited length.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 12 marks)
69. The graphs below show changes in the quantities of an antibiotic used in a hospital and the
percentage of infections caused by bacteria resistant to the antibiotic over the same time period.

14 14
Antibiotic used / Resistance /
12 12
kg %
10 10
8 8
6 6
4 4
2 2
0 0
87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94
Year Year

(a) Explain how bacteria become resistant to antibiotics. Use the information in the graphs to
support your answer.

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(6)
(b) Bacteria were grown on an agar plate and incubated with four different antibiotics.
The antibiotics were placed on paper discs. The resulting plate is shown in the diagram
below.

Areas with
no
Paper A B bacteria
with
antibiotic

C D

(i) Give one piece of evidence that suggests that antibiotic B is more effective at
killing these bacteria than antibiotic C.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(ii) Antibiotic C is a much larger molecule than antibiotic B. Explain why this method
might not be appropriate when comparing the effectiveness of antibiotics B and C.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (iii) Antibiotic C acts by inhibiting the growth of bacterial cell walls. Antibiotic D acts
by interfering with the activity of bacterial ribosomes. Use this information to
explain why neither antibiotic would be effective against viruses.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 11 marks)

70. Tuberculosis (TB) is an infection of the lungs caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium
tuberculosis. TB can often be overcome by the immune system. Macrophages destroy the
bacteria by phagocytosis.

(a) Explain how phagocytosis destroys bacteria.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) An investigation into infection with TB was carried out on mice with very few T helper
cells (CD4 depleted mice). The mice were infected with M. tuberculosis.
Some of the mice were injected with T helper cells taken from mice that were immune to
TB.

The diagram below summarises the experiment.

CD4 depleted CD4 depleted

mouse mouse
T helper cells
injected

Result TB develops No TB develops

 (i) the role of T helper cells in the immune response.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(3)

(ii) the effects of HIV infection on the ability of humans to combat TB.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) In a separate investigation, T helper cells infected with HIV were exposed to fluid from
the lung of a TB patient. This fluid contained chemicals secreted by macrophages, which
activate T helper cells. The results are shown in the table below.

Fluid taken from Rate of HIV production

Healthy lung No change
TB infected lung Increased

Explain the results shown in the table above.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
 (d) Many people are now infected by both M. tuberculosis and HIV (co-infection). Use the
results of both studies above to suggest the effect of co-infection on the rate at which each
disease develops.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
(Total 12 marks)

71. Following the introduction of DNA fingerprinting into forensic testing, many people have been
freed from prison as a result of new evidence provided by the technique.

(a) Give reasons why confidence in the new evidence was strong enough to enable the
release of these prisoners.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Give one example of physical evidence that could be retained from the original
investigation and explain why the sample is suitable for a DNA test to be carried out.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(c) Explain how the results of DNA fingerprinting could be used to find the identity of a dead
person.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
(Total 7 marks)
72. In an investigation, several leaves were removed from a Magnolia tree. These leaves were
weighed and then placed on the surface of some moist compost in an incubator set at 25 °C. At
two-day intervals for a period of 4 weeks, the leaves were weighed and then replaced on to the
surface of the compost.

Figure 1 – Graph of mass of leaves against time after removal from the Magnolia tree

250
Mass of leaves / g

200

150

100

50

0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28
Time after removal from tree / days

Figure 2 – Photograph of a freshly-picked Magnolia leaf compared with a Magnolia leaf that
has been on the surface of the compost for 28 days Freshly-picked leaf Leaf after 28 days on
compost
(a) (i) Describe the changes in the mass of the leaves during the first 14 days of the
investigation.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Suggest why it is unlikely that the activity of saprobiontic microorganisms in the
compost caused these changes in mass during the first 14 days.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(iii) Suggest a possible reason for the changes in mass in the first four days.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)
(b) State one difference in appearance of the two leaves in Figure 2, and suggest how
saprobiontic microorganisms brought about this change.

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(4)

(c) When leaves are added to compost heaps, explain why it is important that the compost is
not allowed to become waterlogged or compacted.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 11 marks)
73. The table below shows when particular groups of organisms are found on a human body after
death.

Group Time after death / days

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
A
B
C
D
E

= group present

(a) Explain how succession could account for the changes in the types of organisms found on
the body.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Describe how a key could be used to identify the organisms on the body.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
 (c) A forensic entomologist was asked to determine the time of death of a person found dead
in a wood. No clothing or personal belongings were found. Organisms from groups C, D
and E were found on the body.

(i) Use the data to estimate the number of days since the person died.

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(ii) Explain why this estimate may be inaccurate.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 7 marks)

74. A transect can be used to study trends in the abundance and distribution of organisms.

(a) Describe one method you could use to estimate the abundance of an organism at intervals
along a transect line.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

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(3)
 (b) State one biotic factor that could be measured at each interval.

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(1)

(c) (i) State one abiotic factor of soil that could determine the distribution of plants.

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(1)

(ii) Describe how you could measure this soil factor.

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(2)
(Total 7 marks)

75. A common test for HIV infection (which can lead to AIDS) looks for the presence of antibodies
against the virus in the blood.

The diagram below shows how HIV stimulates the immune system to produce antibody
molecules.

A B-lymphocyte
B
D

Key
HIV
E
Antibody
(a) Label cells A–E in the spaces provided on the diagram. The first one has been done for
you.
(4)

(b) Suggest how counting the numbers of one type of lymphocyte can provide a measure of
the progress of AIDS in a person with HIV.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) HIV infects human cells by binding to specific proteins on their surface. The gene which
codes for one of these surface proteins has two alleles. Allele a causes susceptibility to
one strain of HIV. Allele A gives protection against this strain of HIV.

The gene for a second surface protein also has two alleles. Allele b causes susceptibility
to a second strain of HIV. Allele B gives protection against this second strain.

A person with the genotype Aabb had a child with a person of the genotype aaBb.
Using a genetic diagram, find the probability that the child was protected against both
strains of HIV.

(4)
(d) Give two common symptoms of HIV/AIDS.

1 ..................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

2 ..................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 12 marks)
76. The antibiotic penicillin acts on a bacterium by weakening its cell wall so that it bursts.
The antibiotic tetracycline interferes with a bacterium‘s protein synthesis, preventing the
production of new proteins by the bacterium.

(a) Suggest one reason why each antibiotic is not effective against viruses.

Penicillin

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

Tetracycline

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Describe and explain how each of these antibiotics would affect the numbers of living
bacterial cells in a laboratory culture.

Penicillin

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................

Tetracycline

.....................................................................................................................................

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(4)
 (c) Suggest how tetracycline helps a person to overcome a bacterial infection.

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(3)
(Total 9 marks)

77. The photograph below shows a herd of cattle on an area of dry grassland and scrub that is
undergoing desertification in central Australia.

Wayne Lawler / Ecoscene

(a) Suggest two possible causes of the desertification of dry grassland in central Australia.

1 ..................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

2 ..................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Describe and explain the processes that lead to desertification of dry grassland.

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(4)
(c) Suggest two ways of preventing desertification in the driest parts of the world such as
Australia.

1 ..................................................................................................................................

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2 ..................................................................................................................................

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(4)
(Total 10 marks)
78. The diagram below shows the general structure of a bacterial cell.

B C
D

A
F

Use the letters on the diagram to identify the structures described below.

(i) Contains antibiotic resistance genes which may be transferred to other bacteria.

............................................................
(1)

(ii) Sites of protein synthesis.

............................................................
(1)

(iii) Contains the enzymes for respiration.

............................................................
(1)
(Total 3 marks)
79. Describe how the disease tuberculosis (TB) is caused.

...............................................................................................................................................

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(Total 3 marks)

80. (a) In the space below, draw a diagram of a chloroplast showing the main features of this
organelle.

On your diagram indicate the location of the light-dependent reactions and the light-
independent reactions.

(4)
(b) Describe the process of non-cyclic photophosphorylation.

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(4)

(c) Describe what happens to the products of non-cyclic photophosphorylation.

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(2)
(Total 10 marks)
81. Compost is usually produced from waste plant material by the action of aerobic
microorganisms. It consists mainly of partly decomposed organic material that is rich in
minerals such as nitrates. A variety of plant material, such as grass cuttings, fallen leaves and
vegetable waste, can be used to produce compost.

The rate of production of compost depends on several factors such as temperature, moisture
content and aeration.

The diagram below shows a container used for producing compost.

Waste plant
material

Slatted container
to allow air
to enter

(a) Explain how nitrates are produced from the waste plant material.

.....................................................................................................................................

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(3)
(b) The compost can be added to soil to provide more nitrates. Explain how nitrates would be
absorbed and used by plants during the growing season.

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(3)

(c) An investigation into the relationship between the temperature in a compost heap and the
external air temperature was carried out. A container was filled with waste plant material.
After 8 weeks, measurements of the temperature in the centre of the compost and the
external air temperature were taken each week. The results of this investigation are shown
on the graph below.

50 –
Compost heap
40 –
External air
C

30 –
Temperature /

20 –

10 –

0–

–10 –
–

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
Time / weeks
(i) Compare the temperature in the compost with the temperature of the external air in
the first six weeks.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Suggest reasons for the differences in the two temperatures in the first six weeks.

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...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (iii) The temperature of the compost falls between week 9 and week 14. Suggest how
changes in factors, other than external air temperature, may have contributed to this
fall in temperature.

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(2)
(Total 12 marks)

82. The distribution of organisms within a habitat or on a world-wide scale is influenced by both
biotic and abiotic factors.

(a) Explain what is meant by the terms biotic and abiotic factors.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
 (b) For a particular habitat that you have studied, describe one technique which you used to
investigate how a specific abiotic factor affected the distribution of a named organism.
(The results of your investigation are not required.)

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(3)
(Total 4 marks)

83. (a) Explain what is meant by the term global warming.

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(3)
(b) In 1976, a scheme was set up to record the distribution and abundance of butterflies in the
United Kingdom. The records show that the abundance and distribution of many species
of butterfly have changed. The graph below shows the changes in the abundance of two
groups of butterflies. The generalists are butterflies found in a wide range of habitats,
while the specialists are butterflies found only in certain types of habitat.

2.4
Generalists
Collated index of abundance  SE

2.2

1.8

1.6

1.4
Specialists
1.2
1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005
Year

(i) Compare the trends and patterns of the abundance of the two groups of butterflies
shown in the graph.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(ii) Suggest reasons for the changes that you have described in (b)(i).

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(3)
(c) The distribution of the Comma butterfly (shown below) has altered considerably since
1982. This butterfly has expanded its range northwards more than any other British
species of butterfly.

The dots on the maps indicate places where the Comma butterfly was recorded.

Copyright © Ecoscene/Robin Williams

N N

1982 2000
 Suggest how global warming could affect the distribution of the Comma butterfly.

.....................................................................................................................................

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(3)
(Total 11 marks)

84. (a) Name the processes described below, selecting the most appropriate answer from the
following list:

absorption combustion decomposition

photosynthesis respiration transpiration

Description Process
(i) Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is converted
into wood by growing trees
(ii) Dead wood is converted to substances which can
be readily absorbed by fungi
(iii) Carbon dioxide is released from carbohydrates
animals have eaten
(iv) Carbon dioxide is released from wood in a
wood-fired power station
(4)
(b) (i) Explain why coal reserves represent a carbon sink.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(ii) Explain why burning wood is described as ‗carbon neutral‘, unlike the burning of
fossil fuel.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(c) The UK Forestry Commission has calculated that, in order to remove the carbon dioxide
produced by an average family car during an average driver‘s lifetime, it would be
necessary to plant 0.5 hectares (5000 m2) of new forest.

Suggest and explain one reason why planting extra forests may not be a complete long
term solution to the problem of rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 9 marks)
85. (a) Explain the difference between the terms ‗global warming‘ and ‗the greenhouse effect‘.

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(3)

(b) The graph below shows the changes in mean global surface temperature between the
years 1880 and 2000.

+1.6

+1.4
Departure from long term mean (ºC)

+1.2

+1.0

+0.8

+0.6

+0.4

+0.2

–0.2

–0.4
1880

1890

1900

1910

1920

1930

1940

1950

1960

1970

1980

1990

2000

Year

(i) Draw the line of best fit on the above graph between 1940 and 2000.
(1)
 (ii) Using your line of best fit, estimate the increase in mean global surface temperature
between 2000 and 2020. Indicate how you made your estimate on the graph and in
the space below.

Estimated increase in temperature .............................................

(3)

(iii) Using the graph to support your answer, suggest why the estimated increase in
temperature might not be an accurate prediction of mean global surface
temperature in 2020.

...........................................................................................................................

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...........................................................................................................................
(3)

(c) Suggest why a relatively small increase in temperature may have a large effect on the
survival of particular species of plants and animals in particular places.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 12 marks)
86. The diagram below shows a chloroplast.

B
A C

(a) (i) Name the parts labelled A, B, C and D.

A ........................................

B .........................................

C ........................................

D ........................................
(2)

(ii) State the part of the chloroplast, shown on the diagram, where oxygen is produced.

...........................................................................................................................
(1)
 (iii) Explain how oxygen is produced in chloroplasts during photosynthesis.

...........................................................................................................................

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...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(3)

(b) Oxygen inhibits the enzyme that catalyses the fixing of carbon dioxide. High
concentrations of oxygen, within a chloroplast, can reduce the rate of photosynthesis.

Describe and explain the effect of high concentrations of oxygen on the rate of
carbohydrate production in a chloroplast.

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(3)
 (c) Suggest two environmental conditions which could increase the rate of oxygen
production by plants.

1 ..................................................................................................................................

2 ..................................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 11 marks)

87. Sunflower seedlings were planted and kept under controlled conditions for 20 days. The gross
primary productivity (GPP) and the net primary productivity (NPP) were measured each day.
The results are shown in the graph below.

35
Primary
productivity/ 30
arbitrary units 25
GPP
20
15 NPP
10
5
0
0 5 10 15 20 25
Time since planting/days

(a) (i) Compare the changes in GPP and NPP during the time period shown on the graph.

...........................................................................................................................

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...........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (ii) Suggest an explanation for the changes you have described in (a)(i).

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(2)

(b) Explain the relationship between GPP, NPP and respiration.

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(2)
(Total 6 marks)

88. Many people infected with the bacterium that causes tuberculosis (TB) do not develop the
disease for a number of years.

(a) Suggest how some TB bacteria avoid being destroyed by the immune system for a
number of years.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
(b) Describe the role of B-cells and T-cells in preventing the development of the symptoms
of TB in an infected person.

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................
(3)

(c) (i) Suggest why a patient infected with TB is more likely to develop symptoms of the
disease if they are also infected by HIV.

...........................................................................................................................

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...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) Give two symptoms which are likely to occur in a person with TB.

1 ........................................................................................................................

2 ........................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 8 marks)
89. Answer the following essay question.

You are expected to answer in continuous prose. You should use examples from the biology
course you have studied but need not restrict yourself to the course content.

You should spend approximately 45 minutes answering this question including planning time.

Marks will be awarded for the following areas:

Breadth: selection of a range of relevant examples (up to 6 marks)

Depth: Further description and discussion of the examples (up to 8 marks)

Balance: Have you answered the question asked; for example have you recognised the
advantages and disadvantages or benefits and risks (up to 6 marks)

Style: Coherence, clarity and expression (up to 4 marks)

The effect of climate change on the world‘s ecosystems is often seen as a potential catastrophe.
Yet wild species and ecosystems are able to adapt to climate change and have done so many
times in the past.

Write an essay on: ‘Biological effects that might be caused by climate change in the 21st
Century: a catastrophe or a harmless change?’
(Total 20 marks)
90. The carbon cycle involves many different organisms and processes. Figure 1 shows how carbon
atoms in the organic waste in the faeces of a mammal may eventually be incorporated into the
organic material forming the wood of a tree.

Figure 1

Organic waste in faeces

Process X

Carbon dioxide in atmosphere

Process Y

Organic material in tree

The formation of woody biomass in large forests acts as an important carbon sink. A study of
northern hemisphere forests made estimates of the carbon stored in woody biomass (carbon
pool) and the mean rate of carbon uptake, in the late 20th century. These estimates are shown
below in Figure 2.

Figure 2

[t = tonnes, ha = hectare, yr = year]

Average Area of Total carbon Mean rate of

Country carbon pool forest / pool in forest carbon uptake
/t ha–1 ha × 106 /t × 106 /t yr–1 × 106
Canada 44.09 239.5 10560 73.12
USA 57.91 215.5 12480 141.53
China 25.77 142.6 3675 38.62
Finland 34.88 17.2 600 5.56
Japan 47.35 19.0 900 11.92
Russia 37.98 24391 283.59
Sweden 39.86 26.5 1056 13.86
Others 59.40 117.4 6974 116.17

(a) With reference to a suitable type of organism, explain how the carbon in the organic
waste in faeces may be converted to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by process X in
Figure 1.

.....................................................................................................................................

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(2)

(b) (i) Name process Y, shown in Figure 1.

...........................................................................................................................
(1)
 (ii) Explain why only a proportion of the organic material, formed using carbon
dioxide, will become plant tissues.

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(2)

(c) Explain the meaning of the term carbon sink.

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.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(d) Using the data in Figure 2, calculate the estimated area of forest in Russia. Show your
working.

Answer ...................................
(2)
(e) The data for the areas of forest and the carbon pools in Canada and the USA are fairly
similar and yet the mean rate of carbon uptake per year in Canada is approximately half
that in the USA. Suggest two reasons for this considerable difference in the mean rates of
carbon uptake in the forests of these two countries.

1 ..................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

2 ..................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(f) Explain how deforestation could have an effect upon the mean temperature of the Earth‘s
surface.

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(4)
(Total 15 marks)
91. A river is an ecosystem which is influenced by the biotic and abiotic factors that are present
within the river itself. The water in a river drains into it from its catchment area.
Factors within the catchment area also have an effect on the river‘s ecosystem.

In a river, there are two sources of plant material that contribute towards the net primary
production. The first source is the living plants which grow within the river itself. Most of these
are algae forming a surface covering on rocks near the surface or suspended in the upper layers
of water. The second source is dead plant material, such as leaves, that is brought in from the
surrounding land. This forms most of the layer of decomposing organic material (detritus) found
on the bed of the river.

The relative quantities of these two types of plant material can determine the types of consumers
in the dependent food chains. The grazing invertebrates that feed on algae tend to form the main
food source for trout and other carnivorous river fish. Invertebrates that feed in the detritus
layers are not easily seen and do not form a major part of the diet of most of these fish.

In New Zealand, the Wangapeka River and the Motupiko River meet to form the Motueka River
which flows into the sea. A study of the Motueka River was carried out to estimate the influence
of dead plant material from the catchment area on the ecosystem. Nine sampling sites between
the sources of the rivers and the sea were selected. The three rivers and the sampling sites in the
catchment area of the study are shown in Figure 1.

At each of the sampling sites, gross primary production (GPP) of algae was estimated by
measuring the production of oxygen in the water over a 24 hour period. As oxygen is released, a
proportion of it will be used during respiration of all organisms in the river community. This
uptake of oxygen, which was also estimated, is known as community respiration (CR). The
estimates were made during winter and summer. These results are shown in Figure 2 and
Figure 3.

[Data adapted from Cawthron Research News September 2002]

Figure 1 – The Wangapeka, Motupiko and Motueka river system.

SEA
MOTUEKA
North RIVER

Direction of = Sampling site

water f ow

WANGAPEKA
RIVER

MOTUPIKO
RIVER
Figure 2 – Gross primary production in the Motueka River catchment area.

16
= Summer
Gross primary production / gO 2 m –2 day –1

14
= Winter
12

10

0
0 25 50 75 100 125 150
Distance from the source / km

Figure 3 – Community respiration in the Motueka River catchment area.

30
Community respiration / gO2 m–2 day –1

= Summer
25
= Winter
20

15

10

0
0 25 50 75 100 125 150
Distance from the source / km
(a) (i) Explain what is meant by the term gross primary production.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(ii) State two abiotic factors that can affect gross primary production in this river
system.

1 ........................................................................................................................

2 ........................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) If the input of dead plant material from the catchment area into a river increased, the
uptake of oxygen would also increase. Give an explanation for this.

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(3)
(c) (i) With reference to Figure 3, compare the trend in community respiration in winter
with that in summer for, the Motueka River catchment area.

...........................................................................................................................

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(2)

(ii) Suggest why community respiration shows this trend.

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...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(d) (i) The numbers of carnivorous fish, such as trout, are higher in the Motueka River
than in the other two rivers. With reference to Figure 2, suggest reasons for this.

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(3)
 (ii) With reference to Figure 3, suggest how the population of these carnivorous fish
might change in the winter.

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(3)
(Total 17 marks)

92. An experiment was carried out to investigate the incidence of antibiotic resistance in two
species of bacteria, Escherichia coli (a Gram negative bacterium) and Staphylococcus aureus (a
Gram positive bacterium).

These bacteria were isolated from 60 people and were tested for resistance to ampicillin and
ampicillin S.

Bacteria Ampicillin Ampicillin S

Sensitive Resistant Sensitive Resistant
E. coli 15 45 25 35
S. aureus 36 24 48 12
(a) Ampicillin and ampicillin S are antibiotics similar in structure to penicillin and which
work in the same way as penicillin. From the data, it can be seen that ampicillin is much
less effective against E. coli than S. aureus.

Explain this observation.

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(4)

(b) Give an explanation for the spread of antibiotic resistance in S. aureus.

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.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(c) Using the data in the table, calculate the percentage increase in sensitivity of S. aureus to
ampicillin S compared with ampicillin. Show your working.

Answer ........................... %
(2)

(d) Some bacteria are resistant to antibiotics because they produce enzymes which break
down the antibiotic. The addition of component S to ampicillin prevents the breakdown
of ampicillin S.

Suggest how component S prevents the breakdown of ampicillin S by the bacterial

enzyme.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
(Total 9 marks)
93. An investigation was carried out to find the distribution of plant species on sand dunes.
A transect was used which extended inland from a beach. Quadrats were used at nine positions
along the transect. The percentage cover of selected species was recorded in each quadrat as
well as the number of plant species in each quadrat. A sample of soil was taken from the area
within each quadrat and used to measure the mass of organic material present.

Gary Skinner, Bioschool

The results are shown in the two tables below.

Quadrat number 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Distance from top
0 80 170 250 500 650 980 1600 1980
of beach / metres
Number of species
1 1 5 11 18 7 5 2 2
found
Mass of organic
0.4 0.3 0.3 0.9 2.8 6.4 25.1 23.4 32.8
material / grams

Percentage cover
Quadrat number 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Bare sand 80 30 30 8
Sea couch 20
Marram grass 70 50 20 5 5
Red Fescue 5 40 55 40
Sea buckthorn 80
Common heather 90
Corsica pine 100
(a) Explain why it is necessary to use a quadrat to estimate percentage cover.

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(2)

(b) Explain why a transect is more appropriate than random sampling in this study.

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(2)
(c) Use the information in both tables to compare the data collected from quadrat 1 and
quadrat 5.

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(3)
 (d) Differences in the variety and number of plant species found in the different quadrats can
be explained by succession. Use the information in the table to suggest how the results of
the study could be explained by succession.

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(5)
(Total 12 marks)

94. One of the reactions of photosynthesis can be summarised as shown below.

water  hydrogen ions + oxygen gas + electrons

(a) Name the reaction shown.

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) Give one other factor, not shown above, that would be required for this reaction to occur
in a chloroplast.

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)
(c) Describe the role of the electrons in the light dependent reaction of photosynthesis.

.....................................................................................................................................

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(4)

(d) Describe and explain how the products of the light dependent reaction are involved in the
production of glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate (GALP).

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(4)
(e) GALP does not accumulate in a chloroplast during photosynthesis. Explain how GALP is
used following its production.

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(2)
(Total 12 marks)
95. A new technique for vaccinating people involves injecting them with DNA.

Viruses have proteins on their coats that are coded for by their DNA. The genes for producing
viral proteins can be isolated and inserted into loops of DNA (plasmids).
Plasmids can enter human cells which will then produce the viral proteins. The proteins will
become part of the surface membrane of the human cell.

The immune system will recognise these proteins as foreign and respond by producing
antibodies and T killer cells.

The process is summarised for one protein in the following diagram.

Plasmid including
gene from viral DNA

Protein synthesis
Cell in human
body

Nucleus
Viral protein
present on cell
surface membrane

Production of
antibodies and
T killer cells by
immune system
(a) Explain why the response of the immune system to the viral proteins is an example of
active immunity.

.....................................................................................................................................

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(2)

(b) Explain how active immunity provides immunity against future infections by the virus.

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(2)
(c) The table below compares the production and distribution of vaccines made using
traditional methods with those made using DNA.

DNA vaccine Traditional vaccine

Time to develop vaccine
2–3 weeks 4–6 months
against new strain of virus
Time to produce enough
doses for effective 2–3 months 2–3 years
protection of population
Treatment during
No special treatment Constant refrigeration
distribution

Use the information in the table to suggest why the DNA vaccine is likely to be more
effective at preventing the spread of a new strain of virus.

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(3)
 (d) A traditional vaccine involves the injection of viral protein into the body. This usually
stimulates the production of antibodies but not T killer cells. Suggest how the use of viral
DNA might be more effective than viral protein in producing immunity to a virus.

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(4)
(Total 11 marks)

96. A new species of large cat, the clouded leopard (Neofelis diardi) has been identified on the
island of Borneo. Neofelis diardi on Borneo is distinct from Neofelis nebulosa on the mainland.
(a) Explain why the clouded leopard and the mainland leopard share the name Neofelis.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) There are 46 genetic differences between the two species of leopard. Explain how these
differences may have arisen, assuming that the two species share a common ancestor.

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(3)
 (c) The clouded leopards are found in regions of the island of Borneo that are governed by
three different countries, Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia.

Suggest reasons why this may make the conservation of leopard habitats difficult.

.....................................................................................................................................

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(2)
(Total 6 marks)

97. Oil is a fossil fuel. It can be used as fuel in power stations and in engines. Figure 1 below
shows oil production between 1960 and 2004.

When oil is burnt, some gases, including carbon dioxide, are released. Some processes by which
carbon dioxide is added to, or removed from, the atmosphere are shown in Figure 2.

Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, which has an influence upon the mean global temperature
of the Earth‘s surface. Changes in this temperature between 1960 and 2004 are shown in Figure
3.
Figure 1. Oil production in thousands of barrels per day between 1960 and 2004

90 000

80 000
Oil production/ 1000 barrels per day

70 000

60 000

50 000

40 000

30 000

20 000

10 000

0
1960

1964
1966
1968
1970
1972
1974
1976
1978
1980
1982
1984
1986
1988
1990
1992
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
1962

Year

Figure 2. Diagram showing part of the carbon cycle

Carbon dioxide in the

atmosphere
Process B

Process C Decaying
material
Process A
Process C

Fuel in a power
station

Oil
Plant biomass
 Figure 3. Changes in the mean global temperature of the Earth’s surface between 1960
and 2004

14.8

14.6

14.4

14.2
Temperature/ C

14.0

13.8

13.6

13.4

13.2

13.0
1960

1964
1966
1968
1970
1972
1974
1976
1978
1980
1982
1984
1986
1988
1990
1992
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
1962

Year

(a) Name the processes A, B and C shown in Figure 2.

A .................................................................

B .................................................................

C .................................................................
(3)
(b) Describe the changes in the production of oil between 1960 and 2004 as shown in Figure
1.

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(3)

(c) Study the graphs in Figures 1 and 3. Do the graphs support the theory that the rise in oil
production is linked to the rise in global temperature? Give reasons for your answer.

.....................................................................................................................................

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(2)

(d) Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas. Explain the term greenhouse gas and give an
example of another greenhouse gas.

.....................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................
(2)
(e) Oil is one type of fossil fuel. Give one other example of a fossil fuel.

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(f) Energy crops are plants grown in large plantations to provide a sustainable source of
energy. These energy crops, such as fast-growing willow, are likely to become far more
common in the future. Explain the term sustainable.

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(g) There is some concern that the replacement of traditional crops, such as wheat, by energy
crops could affect the distribution of some birds normally found on farmland.

A study was undertaken to investigate the effect of changing land use on the distribution
of bird species. Bird surveys were carried out in four habitats: arable land, grassland,
willow plantation on former arable land and willow plantation on former grassland. The
numbers of lapwing, snipe and woodcock were recorded by walking through each survey
area for one hour three times during one summer. The results of this study are shown in
Figure 4.
Figure 4. Results of the bird surveys that were carried out on arable land and grassland
and in willow plantations growing on former arable and grassland

1.0
0.9
Mean number of birds recorded per site

0.8
0.7
0.6 lapwing
per visit

0.5 snipe
woodcock
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
Arable Willow Grassland Willow
land on arable on
land grassland

Use the data in Figure 4 to describe the effect of planting willow on the distribution of
these three species of bird.

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(3)
(Total 16 marks)
98. The table below refers to some structures of microorganisms. Complete the table by writing the
name of the type of microorganism possessing each structure in the empty boxes.

Structure Type of microorganism

Nucleus

Capsid

Flagellum

Peptidoglycan (murein) cell wall

(Total 4 marks)

99. If a horse, Equus caballus, is mated with a donkey, Equus asinus, a hybrid known as a mule is
produced.

Horse Donkey
(Equus caballus ) × (Equus asinus )
2n = 64 2n = 62

Mule

Mules are almost always sterile and produce no offspring. This phenomenon is an example of a
post-zygotic isolating mechanism.
(a) State the diploid number of chromosomes in a mule and suggest why mules are unable to
produce offspring.

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(3)

(b) State what is meant by the term isolating mechanism. Suggest why the production of a
mule by mating a horse with a donkey is described as a post-zygotic isolating mechanism.

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(3)
(c) It has been suggested that the mule should be named as a new species, Equus mulus.
Suggest why this might not be acceptable to some biologists.

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(2)
(Total 8 marks)
100. The diagrams below show the absorption spectra and the action spectrum that were produced in
an investigation of photosynthesis in a flowering plant.

Absorption spectra

carotenoids

Absorption chlorophyll a
/ arbitrary units
chlorophyll b

400 500 600 700

Wavelength / nm

Action spectrum

Rate of
photosynthesis
/ arbitrary units

400 500 600 700

Wavelength / nm
blue light red light
(a) Using the information in the two graphs, explain the relationship between the absorption
and action spectra for this flowering plant.

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(3)

(b) State precisely where the chlorophyll pigments would be found in a chloroplast of a
flowering plant.

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(c) Describe how chromatography could be used to identify the chloroplast pigments from
the leaves of a flowering plant.

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(4)
 (d) Explain why flowering plants grown in soil which is deficient in magnesium ions often
have leaves with pale yellow patches between the veins.

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(2)
(Total 10 marks)

101. Write an essay on the following topic.

Energy flow and succession in ecosystems.

Marks will be awarded for scientific content, coverage of the topic, and the quality of written
communication. You should include in your answer any relevant information from the whole of
your course. You may include diagrams if you wish, but make sure that they are relevant to your
essay and add extra information to it.
(Total 15 marks)

102. EcoR1 is a restriction enzyme that will cut DNA at a certain base sequence to make DNA
fragments suitable for gel electrophoresis.

(a) Below is a diagram showing part of a DNA molecule that has been cut with EcoR1 into
two sections called P and Q. The four bases at the cut (sticky) end of section P have been
labelled.

T T A A

DNA section P DNA section Q

(i) Name a component of the DNA molecule found in the part labelled X.
 ...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(ii) State the letter of the four complementary bases for the sticky end of section P.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)

(iii) Name the base T.

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) EcoR1 cut a piece of DNA which is shown below.

5500bp

(i) The letters bp stand for base pairs when referring to DNA. Name the type of bond
that joins two bases together to form a base pair.

...........................................................................................................................
(1)
(ii) A gel electrophoresis study was undertaken with 5 samples of DNA. Each sample
was made up of a 5500bp section of DNA that had been mixed with two restriction
enzymes. These enzymes cut the DNA section into smaller fragments.
The restriction enzymes were different in each of the five samples.

The results of the study are shown in the diagram of the gel electrophoresis plate
below.

Markers Sample Sample Sample Sample Sample

1 2 3 4 5

3000bp

2500bp

2000bp

1500bp

1000bp

500bp

In one sample the restriction enzymes used were Hind and Bam HI. These enzymes
cut the DNA section as shown below.

Hind Bam HI

1000bp 3000bp 1500bp

 Use both pieces of information to choose the sample that correctly represents the
DNA mixed with Hind and Bam HI.

Sample number: ................................

(1)
(Total 6 marks)

103. The photograph below shows brine shrimps.

A student carried out an investigation to determine the effect of temperature on the hatching
success of brine shrimp eggs. The results are shown below.

Temperature/ °C 22 24 26 28 30 32
% Eggs hatching 36 40 42 44 42 41

(a) Describe the pattern shown by the data in this table.

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(2)
 (b) Suggest why brine shrimps are affected by temperature in the way shown by the data.

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(2)

(c) Suggest how global warming, directly or indirectly, might alter brine shrimp populations.

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(3)
(Total 7 marks)

104. Pollen grains buried in peat can be used to deduce what the climate was like in the past.

(a) (i) State how the age of a peat layer can be estimated.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)
 (ii) The presence of a large amount of alder tree pollen in a layer of peat is taken to
mean that there was high rainfall when the layer was formed. Suggest why it is
thought that the presence of alder pollen in peat indicates high rainfall.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(b) The exoskeletons of many insect species are also found in peat. Exoskeletons are resistant
to decay. Suggest how insect exoskeletons from peat could be used to show that the
climate became warmer over a period of years.

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(2)
 Arctic Ocean

Tundra Russia

Finland
Sweden
wa y
No r

(c) Certain arctic plants are adapted to growing in very cold conditions in the treeless tundra
habitat of northern Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia, near the coast of the Arctic
Ocean.

(i) Suggest why the geographical location of arctic plants makes them especially
vulnerable to extinction due to global warming.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(ii) Increase in temperature increases the rate of respiration more than it increases the
rate of photosynthesis. Suggest why this might be a problem for arctic plants
affected by global warming.

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(2)
(Total 7 marks)
105. HIV can damage the human immune system.

(a) Describe two active immune responses that are affected by HIV infection.

1 ..................................................................................................................................

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2 ..................................................................................................................................

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.....................................................................................................................................
(4)

(b) Non-specific immune responses are not affected by HIV and can continue to prevent
infection. Complete the table below which shows some non-specific immune responses
and descriptions of their functions.

Response Description of function

Inflammation

Engulf and digest bacteria

Lysozyme action

Prevent viruses from multiplying

(4)
(Total 8 marks)
106. An investigation was carried out into the mating preferences of cichlid fish from three
populations (A, B and C) taken from Lake Malawi. The fish were all the same species, but the
males of each population showed distinct physical differences.

Male fish were separated into different areas of a tank by transparent plastic sheets. The plastic
sheets had holes which allowed any female to enter, but prevented the males from leaving.

The diagram below shows the arrangement of the tank.

Male fish Female fish

Hole big
Transparent enough Glass tank
plastic sheets for female
to pass
through

Females from each population were allowed to choose one mate, and their offspring were
collected. The male parent of the offspring was determined using DNA analysis.

The table below shows the number of times mating occurred between individuals of the
different populations in a range of trials.

Female from population

Male from population A B C
A 29 0 0
B 0 26 4
C 0 1 8
(a) Explain how the DNA analysis provides reliable evidence for the identity of male parents.

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(3)

(b) (i) Calculate the percentage of the matings that were between individuals of the same
population. Show your working.

(2)

(ii) Describe the mating preferences shown by the female fish in this investigation.

...........................................................................................................................

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(2)
 (c) Suggest how the data support the hypothesis that population A is the most likely to
become a separate species.

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(4)
(Total 11 marks)

107. The diagram below summarises the light dependent reactions of photosynthesis.

LIGHT Product A

electrons electrons
Chlorophyll Electron carriers Product B

(a) Give the precise location within a chloroplast where this sequence of reactions occurs.

.....................................................................................................................................
(2)

(b) Give the names of product A and product B.

Product A ....................................................................................................................

Product B ....................................................................................................................
(2)
(c) Give the name of the process that provides electrons to replace those lost by chlorophyll.

.....................................................................................................................................
(1)

(d) A chemical called atrazine prevents the flow of electrons to the electron carriers.
Describe and explain the likely effect of atrazine on the production of carbohydrate in a
chloroplast.

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(4)

(e) Atrazine can be used as a weedkiller.

(i) Explain how the presence of weeds can reduce the yield of crop plants.

...........................................................................................................................

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...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (ii) A change in a single gene can alter the electron carriers so that atrazine is
ineffective. Suggest how crop plants unaffected by atrazine could be used to
increase crop yields.

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

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(2)
(Total 13 marks)

108. The graph below shows the growth of two species of fly larvae on a dead body. The temperature
was kept at 22 °C.

50

45 House fly
Flesh fly
40

35
mean body length / mm

30

25

20

15

10

0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
time after death / days
(a) (i) Give one factor, other than temperature, that could affect the growth of insect
larvae on a dead body.

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(ii) Suggest and explain reasons why the time since death that larvae first appear on a
body is different for each species.

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(4)

(b) The growth of the larvae is affected by temperature as shown in Table 1. The effects of
temperature are given as the number of days ahead (+) or behind (–) their development at
22 °C.

Table 1

Effect on development / days

Temperature / °C House fly Flesh fly
12 –4 –4
27 +1 +1.5
Two dead bodies were found at the same address and evidence was needed to decide
whether they died at the same time. One was found in a boiler room with a temperature of
27 °C and the other was found in an outside shed where the temperature was 12 °C.

Insect larvae from both bodies were collected, identified and measured. The results are
shown in Table 2.

Table 2

Mean length of larvae /mm

Site of body House fly Flesh fly
Boiler room 23 45
Shed 6 23

(i) Use the information in the graph, Table 1 and Table 2 for flesh fly larvae to
estimate the time of death for the body in the boiler room. The estimate using
house fly larvae has been done for you.

Suggested Estimated
time since Adjustment for actual time
Length /mm
death at 27 °C / days since death
22 °C / days /days
House fly 23 9 1 8
Flesh fly
(2)

(ii) Use the measurements of larvae from the body in the shed to provide evidence that
the two deaths occurred at approximately the same time.

...........................................................................................................................

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(3)
(Total 10 marks)
109. The graph below shows the changes in population size of bacterial cultures grown in the
presence of three antibiotics, A, B and C. In each case the antibiotic was added at 7 hours.

6000
Antibiotic A

Population size / arbitrary units

5000

4000

3000

2000 Antibiotic B

1000

0 Antibiotic C
0 5 10 15
antibiotic added

Time / hours

(a) Use examples from the graph to explain the differences between bacteriocidal and
bacteriostatic antibiotics.

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.....................................................................................................................................
(3)
(b) A previous investigation on the same bacterium using antibiotic A had produced a curve
similar to that for antibiotic B. Suggest an explanation for the change in the response to
antibiotic A.

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(4)

(c) Outline a technique that could demonstrate the effectiveness of antibiotics on bacteria.

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(4)
(Total 11 marks)
110. Chimpanzees and humans share about 98.4% of their DNA and it is thought that they had a
common ancestor about four million years ago. One gene that shows differences is ‗Fox P2‘
which is involved in speech. All modern humans have the same allele for this gene which is
different from that found in chimpanzees.

(a) Explain how the frequency of the Fox P2 allele could have increased as humans evolved.

.....................................................................................................................................

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(3)

(b) (i) Until 1968 it was illegal to teach evolution in schools in a number of states in the
USA. Suggest two reasons why it was thought necessary to make the teaching of
evolution illegal in these schools.

1 ........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

2 ........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
 (ii) Suggest why the teaching of natural selection has less opposition than the teaching
of evolution.

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...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................

...........................................................................................................................
(2)
(Total 7 marks)

111. SMALL WORLD

It‘s probably not a good idea to take too personal an interest in your microbes. Louis Pasteur,
the great French chemist and bacteriologist, became so preoccupied with his that he took to
peering critically at every dish placed before him with a magnifying glass, a habit that
presumably did not win him many repeat invitations to dinner.

In fact, there is no point in trying to hide from your bacteria, for they are on and around you
always, in numbers you can‘t conceive of. If you are in good health and averagely diligent about
hygiene, you will have a herd of about one trillion bacteria grazing on your fleshy plains – about
a hundred thousand of them on every square centimetre of skin. They are there to dine off the
ten billion or so flakes of skin you shed every day, plus all the tasty oils and fortifying minerals
that seep out from every pore and tissue. You are for them the ultimate buffet, with the
convenience of warmth and constant mobility thrown in. By way of thanks, they give you B.O.

And those are just the bacteria that inhabit your skin. There are trillions more tucked away in
your gut and nasal passages, clinging to your hair and eyelashes, swimming over the surface of
your eyes, drilling through the enamel of your teeth. Your digestive system alone is host to
more than a hundred trillion microbes, of at least four hundred types. Some deal with sugars,
some with starches, some attack other bacteria. A surprising number, like the ubiquitous
intestinal spirochetes, have no detectable function at all. They just seem to like to be with you.
Every human body consists of about ten quadrillion cells, but is host to about a hundred
quadrillion bacterial cells. They are, in short, a big part of us. From the bacteria‘s point of view,
of course, we are a rather small part of them.

Because we humans are big and clever enough to produce and use antibiotics and disinfectants,
it is easy to convince ourselves that we have banished bacteria to the fringes of existence. Don‘t
you believe it. Bacteria may not build cities or have interesting social lives, but they will be here
when the Sun explodes. This is their planet, and we are on it only because they allow us to be.
Bacteria, never forget, got along for billions of years without us. We couldn‘t survive a day
without them. They process our wastes and make them usable again; without their diligent
munching nothing would rot. They purify our water and keep our soils productive. Bacteria
synthesize vitamins in our gut, convert the things we eat into useful sugars and polysaccharides,
and go to war on alien microbes that slip down our gullet.

We depend totally on bacteria to pluck nitrogen from the air and convert it into useful
nucleotides and amino acids for us. It is a prodigious and gratifying feat. As Margulis and Sagan
note, to do the same thing industrially (as when making fertilizers) manufacturers must heat the
source materials to 500 degrees Celsius and squeeze them to 300 times normal pressures.
Bacteria do the same thing all the time without fuss, and thank goodness, for no larger organism
could survive without the nitrogen they pass on. Above all, microbes continue to provide us
with the air we breathe and to keep the atmosphere stable. Microbes, including the modern
versions of cyanobacteria, supply the greater part of the planet‘s breathable oxygen. Algae and
other tiny organisms bubbling away in the sea blow out about 150 billion kilograms of the stuff
every year.

And they are amazingly prolific. The more frantic among them can yield a new generation in
less than ten minutes; Clostridium perfringens the disagreeable little organism that causes
gangrene, can reproduce in nine minutes and then begin at once to split again. At such a rate, a
single bacterium could theoretically produce more offspring in two days than there are protons
in the universe. ‗Given an adequate supply of nutrients, a single bacterial cell can generate
280,000 billion individuals in a single day‘, according to the Belgian biochemist and Nobel
laureate Christian de Duve. In the same period, a human cell can just about manage a single
division.

About once every million divisions, they produce a mutant. Usually this is bad luck for the
mutant – for an organism, change is always risky – but just occasionally the new bacterium is
endowed with some accidental advantage, such as the ability to elude or shrug off an attack of
antibiotics. With this ability to evolve rapidly goes another, even scarier advantage. Bacteria
share information. Any bacterium can take pieces of genetic coding from any other. Essentially,
as Margulis and Sagan put it, all bacteria swim in a single gene pool. Any adaptive change that
occurs in one area of the bacterial universe can spread to any other. It‘s rather as if a human
could go to an insect to get the necessary genetic coding to sprout wings or walk on ceilings. It
means that from a genetic point of view bacteria have become a single super-organism – tiny,
dispersed, but invincible.
They will live and thrive on almost anything you spill, dribble or shake loose. Just give them a
little moisture – as when you run a damp cloth over a counter – and they will bloom as if
created from nothing. They will eat wood, the glue in wallpaper, the metals in hardened paint.
Scientists in Australia found microbes known as Thiobacillus concretivorans which lived in –
indeed, could not live without – concentrations of sulphuric acid strong enough to dissolve
metal. A species called Micrococcus radiophilus was found living happily in the waste tanks of
nuclear reactors, gorging itself on plutonium and whatever else was there. Some bacteria break
down chemical materials from which, as far as we can tell, they gain no benefit at all.

They have been found living in boiling mud pots and lakes of caustic soda, deep inside rocks, at
the bottom of the sea, in hidden pools of icy water in the McMurdo Dry Valleys of Antarctica,
and 11 kilometres down in the Pacific Ocean where pressures are more than a thousand times
greater than at the surface, or equivalent to being squashed beneath fifty jumbo jets. Some of
them seem to be practically indestructible. Deinococcus radiodurans is, according to The
Economist, ‗almost immune to radioactivity‘. Blast its DNA with radiation and the pieces
immediately re-form ‗like the scuttling limbs of an undead creature from a horror movie‘.

Perhaps the most extraordinary survival yet found was that of a Streptococcus bacterium that
was recovered from the sealed lens of a camera that had stood on the Moon for two years. In
short, there are few environments in which bacteria aren‘t prepared to live. ‗They are finding
now that when they push probes into ocean vents so hot that the probes actually start to melt,
there are bacteria even there‘, Victoria Bennett told me.

In the 1920s two scientists at the University of Chicago, Edson Bastin and Frank Greer,
announced that they had isolated from oil wells strains of bacteria that had been living at depths
of 600 metres. The notion was dismissed as fundamentally preposterous – there was nothing to
live on at 600 metres – and for fifty years it was assumed that their samples had been
contaminated with surface microbes. We now know that there are a lot of microbes living deep
within the Earth, many of which have nothing at all to do with the conventionally organic
world. They eat rocks or, rather, the stuff that‘s in rocks – iron, sulphur, manganese and so on.
And they breathe odd things too – iron, chromium, cobalt, even uranium. Such processes may
be instrumental in concentrating gold, copper and other precious metals, and possibly deposits
of oil and natural gas. It has even been sug gested that their tireless nibblings created the Earth‘s
crust.

Some scientists now think that there could be as much as 100 trillion tonnes of bacteria living
beneath our feet in what are known as subsurface lithoautotrophic microbial ecosystems –
SLiME for short. Thomas Gold of Cornell University has estimated that if you took all the
bacteria out of the Earth‘s interior and dumped them on the surface, they would cover the planet
to a depth of 15 metres – the height of a four-storey building. If the estimates are correct, there
could be more life under the Earth than on top of it.
At depth, microbes shrink in size and become extremely sluggish. The liveliest of them may
divide no more than once a century, some no more than perhaps once in five hundred years. As
The Economist has put it: ‗The key to long life, it seems, is not to do too much.‘ When things
are really tough, bacteria are prepared to shut down all systems and wait for better times. In
1997 scientists successfully activated some anthrax spores that had lain dormant for eighty years
in a museum display in Trondheim, Norway. Other microorganisms have leaped back to life
after being released from a 118-year-old can of meat and a 166-year-old bottle of beer. In 1996,
scientists at the Russian Academy of Science claimed to have revived bacteria frozen in
Siberian permafrost for three million years. But the record claim for durability so far is one
made by Russell Vreeland and colleagues at West Chester University in Pennsylvania in 2000,
when they announced that they had resuscitated 250 million-year-old bacteria called Bacillus
permians that had been trapped in salt deposits 600 metres underground in Carlsbad, New
Mexico. If so, this microbe is older than the continents.

The report met with some understandable dubiousness. Many biochemists maintained that over
such a span the microbe‘s components would have become uselessly degraded unless the
bacterium roused itself from time to time. However, if the bacterium did stir occasionally, there
was no plausible internal source of energy that could have lasted so long. The more doubtful
scientists suggested that the sample might have been contaminated, if not during its retrieval
then perhaps while still buried. In 2001, a team from Tel Aviv University argued that B.
permians was almost identical to a strain of modern bacteria, Bacillus marismortui, found in the
Dead Sea. Only two of its genetic sequences differed, and then only slightly.

‗Are we to believe‘, the Israeli researchers wrote, ‗that in 250 million years B. permians has
accumulated the same amount of genetic differences that could be achieved in just 3–7 days in
the laboratory?‘ In reply, Vreeland suggested that ‗bacteria evolve faster in the lab than they do
in the wild.‘

Maybe.

It is a remarkable fact that well into the space age, most school textbooks divided the world of
the living into just two categories – plant and animal. Micro-organisms hardly featured.
Amoebas and similar single-celled organisms were treated as proto-animals and algae as proto-
plants. Bacteria were usually lumped in with plants, too, even though everyone knew they didn‘t
belong there. As far back as the late nineteenth century the German naturalist Ernst Haeckel had
suggested that bacteria deserved to be placed in a separate kingdom, which he called Monera,
but the idea didn‘t begin to catch on among biologists until the 1960s, and then only among
some of them. (I note that my trusty American Heritage desk dictionary from 1969 doesn‘t
recognize the term.)
Many organisms in the visible world were also poorly served by the traditional division. Fungi,
the group that includes mushrooms, moulds, mildews, yeasts and puffballs, were nearly always
treated as botanical objects, though in fact almost nothing about them – how they reproduce and
respire, how they build themselves – matches anything in the plant world. Structurally, they
have more in common with animals in that they build their cells from chitin, a material that
gives them their distinctive texture. The same substance is used to make the shells of insects and
the claws of mammals, though it isn‘t nearly so tasty in a stag beetle as in a Portobello
mushroom. Above all, unlike all plants, fungi don‘t photosynthesize, so they have no
chlorophyll and thus are not green. Instead they grow directly on their food source, which can
be almost anything. Fungi will eat the sulphur off a concrete wall or the decaying matter
between your toes – two things no plant will do. Almost the only plant-like quality they have is
that they root.

Even less comfortably susceptible to categorization was the peculiar group of organisms
formally called myxomycetes but more commonly known as slime moulds. The name no doubt
has much to do with their obscurity. An appellation that sounded a little more dynamic –
‗ambulant self-activating protoplasm‘, say – and less like the stuff you find when you reach
deep into a clogged drain would almost certainly have earned these extraordinary entities a more
immediate share of the attention they deserve, for slime moulds are, make no mistake, among
the most interesting organisms in nature. When times are good, they exist as one-celled
individuals, much like amoebas. But when conditions grow tough, they crawl to a central
gathering place and become, almost miraculously, a slug. The slug is not a thing of beauty and it
doesn‘t go terribly far – usually just from the bottom of a pile of leaf litter to the top, where it is
in a slightly more exposed position – but for millions of years this may well have been the
niftiest trick in the universe.

And it doesn‘t stop there. Having hauled itself up to a more favourable locale, the slime mould
transforms itself yet again, taking on the form of a plant. By some curious orderly process the
cells reconfigure, like the members of a tiny marching band, to make a stalk atop of which
forms a bulb known as a fruiting body. Inside the fruiting body are millions of spores which, at
the appropriate moment, are released to the wind to blow away to become single-celled
organisms that can start the process again.
For years, slime moulds were claimed as protozoa by zoologists and as fungi by mycologists,
though most people could see they didn‘t really belong anywhere. When genetic testing arrived,
people in lab coats were surprised to find that slime moulds were so distinctive and peculiar that
they weren‘t directly related to anything else in nature, and sometimes not even to each other.

In 1969, in an attempt to bring some order to the growing inadequacies of classification, an

ecologist from Cornell named R. H. Whittaker unveiled in the journal Science a proposal to
divide life into five principal branches – kingdoms, as they are known – called Animalia,
Plantae, Fungi, Protista and Monera. Protista was a modification of an earlier term, Protoctista,
which had been suggested a century earlier by a Scottish biologist named John Hogg, and was
meant to describe any organisms that were neither plant nor animal.

Though Whittaker‘s new scheme was a great improvement, Protista remained ill defined. Some
taxonomists reserved the term for large unicellular organisms – the eukaryotes – but others
treated it as the kind of odd-sock drawer of biology, putting into it anything that didn‘t fit
anywhere else. It included (depending on which text you consulted) slime moulds, amoebas,
even seaweed, among much else. By one calculation it contained as many as two hundred
thousand different species of organism all told. That‘s a lot of odd socks.

Ironically, just as Whittaker‘s five-kingdom classification was beginning to find its way into
textbooks, an unassuming academic at the University of Illinois was groping his way towards a
discovery that would challenge everything. His name was Carl Woese (rhymes with rose) and
since the mid-1960s – or about as early as it was possible to do so – he had been quietly
studying genetic sequences in bacteria. In the early days, this was an exceedingly painstaking
process. Work on a single bacterium could easily consume a year. At that time, according to
Woese, only about five hundred species of bacteria were known, which is fewer than the
number of species you have in your mouth. Today the number is about ten times that, though
that is still far short of the 26,900 species of algae, 70,000 of fungi, and 30,800 of amoebas and
related organisms whose biographies fill the annals of biology.
It isn‘t simple indifference that keeps the total low. Bacteria can be exasperatingly difficult to
isolate and study. Only about 1 per cent will grow in culture. Considering how wildly adaptable
they are in nature, it is an odd fact that the one place they seem not to wish to live is a petri dish.
Plop them on a bed of agar and pamper them as you will, and most will just lie there, declining
every inducement to bloom. Any bacterium that thrives in a lab is by definition exceptional, and
yet these were, almost exclusively, the organisms studied by microbiologists. It was, said
Woese, ‗like learning about animals from visiting zoos‘.

Genes, however, allowed Woese to approach micro organisms from another angle. As he
worked, Woese realized that there were more fundamental divisions in the microbial world than
anyone suspected. A lot of little organisms that looked like bacteria and behaved like bacteria
were actually something else altogether – something that had branched off from bacteria a long
time ago. Woese called these organisms archaebacteria, later shortened to archaea.

It has to be said that the attributes that distinguish archaea from bacteria are not the sort that
would quicken the pulse of any but a biologist. They are mostly differences in their lipids and
an absence of something called peptidoglycan. But in practice they make a world of difference.
Archaea are more different from bacteria than you and I are from a crab or spider.
Singlehandedly, Woese had discovered an unsuspected division of life, so fundamental that it
stood above the level of kingdom at the apogee of the Universal Tree of Life, as it is rather
reverentially known.

In 1976 he startled the world – or at least the little bit of it that was paying attention – by
redrawing the Tree of Life to incorporate not five main divisions, but twenty-three. These he
grouped under three new principal categories – Bacteria, Archaea and Eukarya (sometimes
spelled Eucarya) – which he called domains. The new arrangement was as follows:

• Bacteria: cyanobacteria, purple bacteria, gram-positive bacteria, green non-sulphur

bacteria, flavobacteria and thermotogales
• Archaea: halophilic archaeans, methanosarcina, methanobacterium, methanoncoccus,
thermoceler, thermoproteus and pyrodictium
• Eukarya: diplomads, microsporidia, trichomonads, flagellates, entameba, slime moulds,
ciliates, plants, fungi and animals
Woese‘s new divisions did not take the biological world by storm. Some dismissed his system
as much too heavily weighted towards the microbial. Many just ignored it. Woese, according to
Frances Ashcroft, ‗felt bitterly disappointed‘. But slowly his new scheme began to catch on
among microbiologists. Botanists and zoologists were much slower to appreciate its virtues. It‘s
not hard to see why. In Woese‘s model, the worlds of botany and zoology are relegated to a few
twigs on the outermost branch of the Eukaryan limb. Everything else belongs to unicellular
beings.

‗These folks were brought up to classify in terms of gross morphological similarities and
differences,‘ Woese told an interviewer in 1996. ‗The idea of doing so in terms of molecular
sequence is a bit hard for many of them to swallow.‘ In short, if they couldn‘t see a difference
with their own eyes, they didn‘t like it. And so they persisted with the more conventional five-
kingdom division – an arrangement that Woese called ‗not very useful‘ in his milder moments
and ‗positively misleading‘ much of the rest of the time. ‗Biology, like physics before it,‘
Woese wrote, ‗has moved to a level where the objects of interest and their interactions often
cannot be perceived through direct observation.‘

In 1998 the great and ancient Harvard zoologist Ernst Mayr (who then was in his ninety-fourth
year and at the time of my writing is nearing one hundred and still going strong) stirred the pot
further by declaring that there should be just two prime divisions of life – ‗empires‘ he called
them. In a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Mayr said
that Woese‘s findings were interesting but ultimately misguided, noting that ‗Woese was not
trained as a biologist and quite naturally does not have an extensive familiarity with the
principles of classification,‘ which is perhaps as close as one distinguished scientist can come to
saying of another that he doesn‘t know what he is talking about.

The specifics of Mayr‘s criticisms are highly technical – they involve issues of meiotic
sexuality, Hennigian cladification and controversial interpretations of the genome of
Methanobacterium thermoautrophicum, among rather a lot else – but essentially he argues that
Woese‘s arrangement unbalances the Tree of Life. The bacterial realm, Mayr notes, consists of
no more than a few thousand species while the archaean has a mere 175 named specimens, with
perhaps a few thousand more to be found – ‗but hardly more than that‘. By contrast, the
eukaryotic realm – that is, the complicated organisms with nucleated cells, like us – numbers
already in the millions of species. For the sake of ‗the principle of balance‘, Mayr argues for
combining the simple bacterial organisms in a single category, Prokaryota, while placing the
more complex and ‗highly evolved‘ remainder in the empire Eukaryota, which would stand
alongside as an equal. Put another way, he argues for keeping things much as they were before.
This division between simple cells and complex cells ‗is where the great break is in the living
world‘.
If Woese‘s new arrangement teaches us anything it is that life really is various and that most of
that variety is small, unicellular and unfamiliar. It is a natural human impulse to think of
evolution as a long chain of improvements, of a never-ending advance towards largeness and
complexity – in a word, towards us. We flatter ourselves. Most of the real diversity in evolution
has been small-scale. We large things are just flukes – an interesting side branch. Of the twenty-
three main divisions of life, only three – plants, animals and fungi – are large enough to be seen
by the human eye, and even they contain species that are microscopic. Indeed, according to
Woese, if you totalled up all the biomass of the planet – every living thing, plants included –
microbes would account for at least 80 per cent of all there is, perhaps more. The world belongs
to the very small – and it has done for a very long time.

So why, you are bound to ask at some point in your life, do microbes so often want to hurt us?
What possible satisfaction could there be to a microbe in having us grow feverish or chilled, or
disfigured with sores, or above all deceased? A dead host, after all, is hardly going to provide
long-term hospitality.

To begin with, it is worth remembering that most micro organisms are neutral or even beneficial
to human well-being. The most rampantly infectious organism on Earth, a bacterium called
Wolbachia, doesn‘t hurt humans at all – or, come to that, any other vertebrates – but if you are a
shrimp or worm or fruit fly, it can make you wish you had never been born. Altogether, only
about one microbe in a thousand is a pathogen for humans, according to the National
Geographic – though, knowing what some of them can do, we could be forgiven for thinking
that that is quite enough. Even if most of them are benign, microbes are still the number three
killer in the Western world – and even many that don‘t kill us make us deeply rue their
existence.

Making a host unwell has certain benefits for the microbe. The symptoms of an illness often
help to spread the disease. Vomiting, sneezing and diarrhoea are excellent methods of getting
out of one host and into position for boarding another. The most effective strategy of all is to
enlist the help of a mobile third party. Infectious organisms love mosquitoes because the
mosquito‘s sting delivers them directly into a bloodstream where they can get straight to work
before the victim‘s defence mechanisms can figure out what‘s hit them. This is why so many
grade A diseases – malaria, yellow fever, dengue fever, encephalitis and a hundred or so other
less celebrated but often rapacious maladies – begin with a mosquito bite. It is a fortunate fluke
for us that HIV, the AIDS agent, isn‘t among them – at least not yet. Any HIV the mosquito
sucks up on its travels is dissolved by the mosquito‘s own metabolism. When the day comes
that the virus mutates its way around this, we may be in real trouble.
It is a mistake, however, to consider the matter too carefully from the position of logic because
microorganisms clearly are not calculating entities. They don‘t care what they do to you any
more than you care what distress you cause when you slaughter them by the millions with a
soapy shower or a swipe of deodorant. The only time your continuing well-being is of
consequence to a pathogen is when it kills you too well. If they eliminate you before they can
move on, then they may well die out themselves. History, Jared Diamond notes, is full of
diseases that ‗once caused terrifying epidemics and then disappeared as mysteriously as they
had come‘. He cites the robust but mercifully transient English sweating sickness, which raged
from 1485 to 1552, killing tens of thousands as it went, before burning itself out. Too much
efficiency is not a good thing for any infectious organism.

A great deal of sickness arises not because of what the organism has done to you but because of
what your body is trying to do to the organism. In its quest to rid the body of pathogens, the
immune system sometimes destroys cells or damages critical tissues, so often when you are
unwell what you are feeling is not the pathogens but your own immune responses. Anyway,
getting sick is a sensible response to infection. Sick people retire to their beds and thus are less
of a threat to the wider community.

Because there are so many things out there with the potential to hurt you, your body holds lots
of different varieties of defensive white blood cells – some ten million types in all, each
designed to identify and destroy a particular sort of invader. It would be impossibly inefficient
to maintain ten million separate standing armies, so each variety of white blood cell keeps only
a few scouts on active duty.

When an infectious agent – what‘s known as an antigen – invades, relevant scouts identify the
attacker and put out a call for reinforcements of the right type. While your body is
manufacturing these forces, you are likely to feel wretched. The onset of recovery begins when
the troops finally swing into action.

White cells are merciless and will hunt down and kill every last pathogen they can find. To
avoid extinction, attackers have evolved two elemental strategies. Either they strike quickly and
move on to a new host, as with common infectious illnesses like flu, or they disguise themselves
so that the white cells fail to spot them, as with HIV, the virus responsible for AIDS, which can
sit harmlessly and unnoticed in the nuclei of cells for years before springing into action.
One of the odder aspects of infection is that microbes that normally do no harm at all sometimes
get into the wrong parts of the body and ‗go kind of crazy‘, in the words of Dr Bryan Marsh, an
infectious diseases specialist at Dartmouth–Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, New
Hampshire. ‗It happens all the time with car accidents when people suffer internal injuries.
Microbes that are normally benign in the gut get into other parts of the body – the bloodstream,
for instance – and cause terrible havoc.‘

The scariest, most out-of-control bacterial disorder of the moment is a disease called necrotizing
fasciitis in which bacteria essentially eat the victim from the inside out, devouring internal tissue
and leaving behind a pulpy, noxious residue. Patients often come in with comparatively mild
complaints – a skin rash and fever, typically – but then dramatically deteriorate. When they are
opened up it is often found that they are simply being consumed. The only treatment is what is
known as ‗radical excisional surgery‘ – cutting out every bit of infected area. Seventy per cent
of victims die; many of the rest are left terribly disfigured. The source of the infection is a
mundane family of bacteria called Group A Streptococcus, which normally do no more than
cause strep throat. Very occasionally, for reasons unknown, some of these bacteria get through
the lining of the throat and into the body proper, where they wreak the most devastating havoc.
They are completely resistant to antibiotics. About a thousand cases a year occur in the United
States and no-one can say that it won‘t get worse.

Precisely the same thing happens with meningitis. At least 10 per cent of young adults, and
perhaps 30 per cent of teenagers, carry the deadly meningococcal bacterium, but it lives quite
harmlessly in the throat. Just occasionally – in about one young person in a hundred thousand –
it gets into the bloodstream and makes them very ill indeed. In the worst cases, death can come
in twelve hours. That‘s shockingly quick. ‗You can have a person who‘s in perfect health at
breakfast and dead by evening,‘ says Marsh.
We would have much more success with bacteria if we weren‘t so profligate with our best
weapon against them: antibiotics. Remarkably, by one estimate some 70 per cent of the
antibiotics used in the developed world are given to farm animals, often routinely in stock feed,
simply to promote growth or as a precaution against infection. Such applications give bacteria
every opportunity to evolve a resistance to them. It is an opportunity that they have
enthusiastically seized.

In 1952, penicillin was fully effective against all strains of staphylococcus bacteria, to such an
extent that by the early 1960s the US surgeon-general, William Stewart, felt confident enough
to declare: ‗The time has come to close the book on infectious diseases. We have basically
wiped out infection in the United States.‘ Even as he spoke, however, some 90 per cent of those
strains were in the process of developing immunity to penicillin. Soon one of these new strains,
called methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus, began to show up in hospitals. Only one type
of antibiotic, vanomycin, remained effective against it, but in 1997 a hospital in Tokyo reported
the appearance of a strain that could resist even that. Within months it had spread to six other
Japanese hospitals. All over, the microbes are beginning to win the war again: in US hospitals
alone, some fourteen thousand people a year die from infections they pick up there. As James
Surowiecki noted in a New Yorker article, given a choice between developing antibiotics that
people will take every day for two weeks and antidepressants that people will take every day for
ever, drug companies not surprisingly opt for the latter. Although a few antibiotics have been
toughened up a bit, the pharmaceutical industry hasn‘t given us an entirely new antibiotic since
the 1970s.

Our carelessness is all the more alarming since the discovery that many other ailments may be
bacterial in origin. The process of discovery began in 1983 when Barry Marshall, a doctor in
Perth, Western Australia, found that many stomach cancers and most stomach ulcers are caused
by a bacterium called Helicobacter pylori. Even though his findings were easily tested, the
notion was so radical that more than a decade would pass before they were generally accepted.
America‘s National Institutes of Health, for instance, didn‘t officially endorse the idea until
1994. ‗Hundreds, even thousands of people must have died from ulcers who wouldn‘t have,‘
Marshall told a reporter from Forbes in 1999.

Since then, further research has shown that there is or may well be a bacterial component in all
kinds of other disorders – heart disease, asthma, arthritis, multiple sclerosis, several types of
mental disorders, many cancers, even, it has been suggested (in Science no less), obesity. The
day may not be far off when we desperately require an effective antibiotic and haven‘t got one
to call on.

It may come as a slight comfort to know that bacteria can themselves get sick. They are
sometimes infected by bacteriophages (or simply phages), a type of virus. A virus is a strange
and unlovely entity – ‗a piece of nucleic acid surrounded by bad news‘ in the memorable phrase
of the Nobel laureate Peter Medawar. Smaller and simpler than bacteria, viruses aren‘t
themselves alive. In isolation they are inert and harmless. But introduce them into a suitable
host and they burst into busyness – into life. About five thousand types of virus are known, and
between them they afflict us with many hundreds of diseases, ranging from the flu and common
cold to those that are most invidious to human well-being: smallpox, rabies, yellow fever,
Ebola, polio and AIDS.
Viruses prosper by hijacking the genetic material of a living cell, and using it to produce more
virus. They reproduce in a fanatical manner, then burst out in search of more cells to invade.
Not being living organisms themselves, they can afford to be very simple. Many, including
HIV, have ten genes or fewer, whereas even the simplest bacteria require several thousand.
They are also very tiny, much too small to be seen with a conventional microscope. It wasn‘t
until 1943 and the invention of the electron microscope that science got its first look at them.
But they can do immense damage. Smallpox in the twentieth century alone killed an estimated
300 million people.

They also have an unnerving capacity to burst upon the world in some new and startling form
and then to vanish again as quickly as they came. In 1916, in one such case, people in Europe
and America began to come down with a strange sleeping sickness, which became known as
encephalitis lethargica. Victims would go to sleep and not wake up. They could be roused
without great difficulty to take food or go to the lavatory, and would answer questions sensibly
– they knew who and where they were – though their manner was always apathetic. However,
the moment they were permitted to rest, they would at once sink back into deepest slumber and
remain in that state for as long as they were left. Some went on in this manner for months before
dying. A very few survived and regained consciousness but not their former liveliness. They
existed in a state of profound apathy, ‗like extinct volcanoes‘, in the words of one doctor. In ten
years the disease killed some five million people and then quietly went away. It didn‘t get much
lasting attention because in the meantime an even worse epidemic – indeed, the worst in history
– swept across the world.

It is sometimes called the Great Swine Flu epidemic and sometimes the Great Spanish Flu
epidemic, but in either case it was ferocious. The First World War killed 21 million people in
four years; swine flu did the same in its first four months. Almost 80 per cent of American
casualties in the First World War came not from enemy fire, but from flu. In some units the
mortality rate was as high as 80 per cent.

Swine flu arose as a normal, non-lethal flu in the spring of 1918, but somehow, over the
following months – no-one knows how or where – it mutated into something more severe. A
fifth of victims suffered only mild symptoms, but the rest became gravely ill and many died.
Some succumbed within hours; others held on for a few days.

In the United States, the first deaths were recorded among sailors in Boston in late August 1918,
but the epidemic quickly spread to all parts of the country. Schools closed, public
entertainments were shut down, people everywhere wore masks. It did little good. Between
autumn 1918 and spring the following year, 548,452 people died of the flu in America. The toll
in Britain was 220,000, with similar numbers in France and Germany. No-one knows the global
toll, as records in the third world were often poor, but it was not less than twenty million and
probably more like fifty million. Some estimates have put the global total as high as a hundred
million.
In an attempt to devise a vaccine, medical authorities conducted experiments on volunteers at a
military prison on Deer Island in Boston Harbor. The prisoners were promised pardons if they
survived a battery of tests. These tests were rigorous to say the least. First, the subjects were
injected with infected lung tissue taken from the dead and then sprayed in the eyes, nose and
mouth with infectious aerosols. If they still failed to succumb, they had their throats swabbed
with discharges taken straight from the sick and dying. If all else failed, they were required to sit
open-mouthed while a gravely ill victim was sat up slightly and made to cough into their faces.

Out of – somewhat amazingly – three hundred men who volunteered, the doctors chose sixty-
two for the tests. None contracted the flu – not one. The only person who did grow ill was the
ward doctor, who swiftly died. The probable explanation for this is that the epidemic had passed
through the prison a few weeks earlier and the volunteers, all of whom had survived that
visitation, had a natural immunity.

Much about the 1918 flu epidemic is understood poorly or not at all. One mystery is how it
erupted suddenly, all over, in places separated by oceans, mountain ranges and other earthly
impediments. A virus can survive for no more than a few hours outside a host body, so how
could it appear in Madrid, Bombay and Philadelphia all in the same week?

The probable answer is that it was incubated and spread by people who had only slight
symptoms or none at all. Even in normal outbreaks, about 10 per cent of people in any given
population have the flu but are unaware of it because they experience no ill effects. And because
they remain in circulation they tend to be the great spreaders of the disease.

That would account for the 1918 outbreak‘s widespread distribution, but it still doesn‘t explain
how it managed to lie low for several months before erupting so explosively at more or less the
same time all over. Even more mysterious is that it was most devastating to people in the prime
of life. Flu normally is hardest on infants and the elderly, but in the 1918 outbreak deaths were
overwhelmingly among people in their twenties and thirties. Older people may have benefited
from resistance gained from an earlier exposure to the same strain, but why the very young were
similarly spared is unknown. The greatest mystery of all is why the 1918 flu was so ferociously
deadly when most flus are not. We still have no idea.
From time to time certain strains of virus return. A disagreeable Russian virus known as H1N1
caused severe outbreaks over wide areas in 1933, then again in the 1950s and yet again in the
1970s. Where it went in the meantime each time is uncertain. One suggestion is that viruses
hide out unnoticed in populations of wild animals before trying their hand at a new generation
of humans. No-one can rule out the possibility that the great swine flu epidemic might once
again rear its head.

And if it doesn‘t, others well might. New and frightening viruses crop up all the time. Ebola,
Lassa and Marburg fevers all have tended to flare up and die down again, but no-one can say
that they aren‘t quietly mutating away somewhere, or simply awaiting the right opportunity to
burst forth in a catastrophic manner. It is now apparent that AIDS has been among us much
longer than anyone originally suspected. Researchers at the Manchester Royal Infirmary
discovered that a sailor who had died of mysterious, untreatable causes in 1959 in fact had
AIDS. Yet, for whatever reasons, the disease remained generally quiescent for another twenty
years.

The miracle is that other such diseases haven‘t gone rampant. Lassa fever, which wasn‘t first
detected until 1969 in West Africa, is extremely virulent and little understood. In 1969, a doctor
at a Yale University lab in New Haven, Connecticut, who was studying Lassa fever came down
with it. He survived, but, more alarmingly, a technician in a nearby lab, with no direct exposure,
also contracted the disease and died.

Happily the outbreak stopped there, but we can‘t count on always being so fortunate. Our
lifestyles invite epidemics. Air travel makes it possible to spread infectious agents across the
planet with amazing ease. An Ebola virus could begin the day in, say, Benin, and finish it in
New York or Hamburg or Nairobi, or all three. It means also that medical authorities
increasingly need to be acquainted with pretty much every malady that exists everywhere, but of
course they are not. In 1990, a Nigerian living in Chicago was exposed to Lassa fever on a visit
to his homeland, but didn‘t develop symptoms until he had returned to the United States. He
died in a Chicago hospital without diagnosis and without anyone taking any special precautions
in treating him, unaware that he had one of the most lethal and infectious diseases on the planet.
Miraculously, no-one else was infected. We may not be so lucky next time.

And on that sobering note, it‘s time to return to the world of the visibly living.

© Bill Bryson, published by Black Swan, a division of Transworld Publishers. All rights reserved. Reprinted by
permission of Random House Group Ltd.
Use the information from the article, and your own knowledge, to answer the following
questions.

(a) With reference to evidence in the article, explain why it can be argued that bacteria
represent the most dominant group of organisms in the world.

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(4)

(b) (i) Outline the principles underlying Woese‘s three domain system of taxonomy:
Bacteria, Archaea and Eukarya.

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(2)
 (ii) Suggest why the three domain system proposed by Woese has not been adopted by
all biologists.

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(2)

(c) Give two key differences between prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells.

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(2)

(d) Explain what Margulis and Sagan meant by ‗all bacteria swim in a single gene pool‘.

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(2)
(e) Explain why it is often your immune system that makes you ‗feel wretched‘ rather than
the disease.

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(3)

(f) Explain why methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) has developed so

quickly.

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(4)
 (g) Suggest why the Ebola virus has not yet caused a global epidemic.

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(1)
(Total 20 marks)

112. Data for use with the questions that follow.

Figure 1. Microscopic phytoplankton.

Phytoplankton are microscopic single-celled plant-like organisms which live in
vast numbers in the sea floating just below the surface where they carry out
photosynthesis.
Marine phytoplankton account for over 50% of the world’s primary
productivity.

Figure 2. Calanus is a herbivorous small animal which makes up most of the zooplankton
of the North Sea and feeds on phytoplankton. Calanus appears in the North Sea
in March and starts to breed, but its numbers do not reach a maximum until
July. Between late August to early October they leave the North Sea and return
to the deep waters of the North Atlantic Ocean to spend the winter. Calanus are
the main food source of many small fish as well as the young of larger fish such
as herring and cod.
Figure 3. Sandeels.
Sandeels are small fish which make up almost a half of the mass of fish in the
North Sea. They feed on zooplankton, particularly Calanus. They are an
important part of the diet of many of the larger fish such as cod and herrings
caught for human food. Sandeels are also important in the diet of many sea
birds such as puffins and kittiwakes. Sandeels are caught in vast numbers to
make fish-meal food used for farm animals.

Figure 4. Productivity due to phytoplankton in North Sea over a twelve month period.

35

30
Primary productivity / g Cm –2

25
monthly total

20

15

10

0
J F M A M J J A S O N D
Month
Figure 5. Mean sea surface temperature of the North Sea over a twelve month period.

20

18

16
Mean monthly sea temperature

14

12
degrees C

10

0
J F M A M J J A S O N D
Month

Figure 6. Breeding stock biomass of two species of fish in the North Sea. Herring stocks
fell so low that from 1978 until 1982, fishing for this species in the North Sea
was banned. In 2000 the EU negotiated a reduction in fishing for cod but
scientists believed that the ‘fishing quotas’ agreed by the EU were too high to
allow cod to recover to a sustainable level.

2,500 Cod
Herring
2,000
biomass / tonnes
Total breeding

1,500

1,000

500

0
1963 1969 1975 1981 1987 1993 1999 2005
Year
Figure 7. Location map.

ay
rw
No
North
Sea

UK

Acknowledgements

Based on data in ‗Phytoplankton, biomass and production in the southern North Sea‘.
Joint, I. and Pomroy, A. (1993) Marine Ecology Progress Series. 99: 169–182.

Based on Zhihong Li, Holt M. and Osborne, J. (2000) ‗A baroclinic model of the NW European
shelf seas‘. http://www.google.co.uk/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-
8&rls=GGLG,GGLG:2006-16,GGLG:en&q=north+sea+temperature+annual+cycle

http://www.aslo.org/photopost/showphoto.php?photo=1007&papass=&sort=1&thecat=500

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=367
Read and use the data above, and your own knowledge, to answer the following questions.

(a) (i) Construct an appropriate food web diagram to show the feeding relationships
between the organisms referred to in the data booklet and which shows the trophic
levels each organism occupies.

(3)

(ii) Explain why the total biomass of cod in the North Sea is normally much less than
the total biomass of sand eels.

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(2)

(b) (i) Suggest two advantages to the phytoplankton of being concentrated just below the
sea surface (Figures 1 and 4).

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(2)
 (ii) Like land plants, phytoplankton require mineral salts. Suggest why phosphates are
essential for the growth of phytoplankton.

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(1)

(c) (i) In Figure 4, the units used to express primary productivity are abbreviated as
gCm–2. Given that ‗C‘ stands for organic carbon and the other letters are common
metric units, suggest what gCm–2 stands for by writing it out in full.

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(ii) With reference to Figures 4 and 5, discuss the extent to which mean sea surface
temperature controls the primary productivity of phytoplankton.

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(3)
 (iii) Measurements show that the mean light intensity for the months May and July is
the same, but the mean sea surface temperature is 8oC higher in July than in May.
Suggest why, in spite of this, primary productivity is similar in these two months.

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(2)

(d) The numbers of Calanus in the North Sea have been decreasing since 1960 and there is
some evidence that this may be due to climate change. The distribution of Calanus
finmarchicus, one of the most abundant species, seems to be shifting northwards,
becoming more common off the coast of Norway. Suggest why Calanus may not succeed
so well in warmer water.

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(2)
(e) (i) There are several reasons why commercially important stocks of fish, such as cod
and herring, are under threat in the North Sea. Using information in Figure 6
explain why over-fishing by humans is almost certainly part of the problem.

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(2)

(ii) Nets used by fishermen in the North Sea are required to have a mesh size which
catches larger fish but allows the smaller (younger) fish to escape. This acts as a
selection pressure on the cod population. Explain the effects this selection pressure
might have on the phenotypes of these cod in future generations.

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(2)
(Total 20 marks)
113. (a) The electron microscope image below shows part of a chloroplast.

The table below gives one function of each of the three structures labelled A, B and C on
the electron microscope image. Complete the table below by writing in the appropriate
letter and the name of each structure.

Function Label letter Name of structure

Photophosphorylation

Stores non-carbohydrate
organic material

Carbon fixation
(3)

(b) The equation below summarises the process of photolysis of water.

2H2O  4H+ + 4e– + O2

(i) Explain what happens to the electrons released by photolysis.

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(2)
 (ii) The electrons are later involved in the reduction of NADP. Explain the importance
of reduced NADP in the light-independent reactions of photosynthesis.

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(3)

(c) The rate at which plants produce carbohydrate by photosynthesis is known as gross
primary productivity.

Put a cross in the box next to the equation that shows the relationship between gross
primary productivity (GPP), net primary productivity (NPP) and respiration (R).

GPP + R = NPP

GPP + NPP = R

GPP = NPP + R

GPP = NPP – R
(1)

(d) The table below shows the net primary productivity in four different ecosystems. The
ecosystems in the table are listed in order of increasing distance from the equator, starting
with tropical rainforest.

Net primary productivity

Ecosystem
/ kJ m–2 year–1
Tropical rainforest 37 800
Temperate forest 25 200
Boreal forest 14 700
Polar tundra 2 400
(i) It is estimated that 85% of the energy available to primary consumers will not be
available to secondary consumers. Calculate the energy that will be available to the
secondary consumers in the tropical rainforest. Show your working.

Answer ................................. kJ m–2 year–1

(2)

(ii) Suggest two reasons for the differences in the net primary productivity as the
distance from the equator increases.

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(2)
(Total 13 marks)
114. A study of the distribution and abundance of three different seaweeds was carried out in the
intertidal region of a gently sloping rocky shore. The intertidal region is the area that will be
covered by water as the tide comes in and uncovered by water as the tide goes out.

The abundance of each seaweed was found by estimating its percentage cover at regular
intervals from the high water mark at the top of the shore to the low water mark lower down the
shore.

The results of this study are shown on the graph below.

60
55
50
Percentagee cover / %

45 Chondrus
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5 Fucus
0 Ascophyllum
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14
Distance from high water mark /metres

(a) (i) Put a cross in the box next to the statement that could form part of a valid
conclusion from the data shown in the graph.

A – Ascophyllum grows only in regions that are uncovered by water

for long periods of time

B – Fucus grows better in regions that are never uncovered by water

C – Chondrus may not be able to compete with Ascophyllum

(1)
 (ii) With reference to the graph discuss the validity of statements A, B and C.

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(3)

(b) Suggest two abiotic factors, other than the length of time the seaweeds are out of water,
that could affect the distribution of the seaweeds on this shore.

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(2)
 (c) Describe a technique that you have used to study the distribution of a named organism
within its habitat.

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(4)
(Total 10 marks)

115. A study of tree pollen grains in a peat bog in Finland was carried out. The number of pollen
grains of different tree species was recorded at different depths in the peat.

The data for four of these trees are given as a percentage of the total tree pollen sample, in the
table below. An estimate of the age of the sample at each depth was also made.

Depth of Age / Tree pollen grain / %

sample years
/m Larch Spruce Pine Beech

0.5 2 850 0 0 53 43
1.0 3 770 0 0 55 40
1.5 5 600 0 0 31 47
2.0 6 390 0 12 15 53
2.5 8 170 5 36 4 48
3.0 8 700 38 36 6 35
3.5 8 780 27 40 3 32
4.0 10 000 10 22 2 40
The diagram below shows the present-day distribution of the four tree species found in the main
climatic zones of the northern hemisphere.

Climatic zone Distribution of trees

Arctic

Boreal
Larch Spruce

Pine
Temperate Beech

Sub-tropical

(a) Suggest how pollen grains can provide evidence about which species of tree were
growing successfully in Finland as the peat bog was forming.

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(2)

(b) (i) Put a cross in the box next to the species of tree that does not provide evidence
about the changes in climate in Finland during the last 10 000 years.

A Larch

B Spruce

C Pine

D Beech
(1)
 (ii) Explain your answer to (b)(i).

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(2)

(c) With reference to the present-day distribution of the four tree species and the results of
the pollen grain study, suggest in what way the climate in Finland has changed during the
last 10 000 years. Give reasons for your answer.

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(5)
 (d) Describe how dendrochronology can be used to provide evidence for climate change.

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(2)
(Total 12 marks)

116. In 1937, a population of sockeye salmon was released into Lake Washington in the USA.
Since then, the original stock appears to have split into two different populations which do not
interbreed. One group of salmon breeds in the shallow waters of the lake. The other group
breeds in a fast-flowing river that flows into the lake.

These two populations of salmon have developed very different physical features. In the river,
the male fish are more streamlined than those in the lake. This is thought to enable them to deal
with the river‘s strong current. The females in the river are larger and more muscular than those
in the lake population. This allows them to bury their eggs deep into the gravel, which is
necessary to stop the eggs being dislodged by the fast water flow.

In addition, scientists have found evidence that the two populations appear to have developed
differences between their gene pools. It is suggested that the Lake Washington salmon
populations may eventually evolve into two separate species.
(a) State the term used to describe

(i) the separation of one species into two populations that do not interbreed

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(ii) the formation of two new species from one species

...........................................................................................................................
(1)

(iii) the relative proportion of different forms of a particular gene within a gene pool.

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(1)

(b) Suggest how the two populations of salmon developed differences in their gene pools.

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(5)
 (c) Explain how new alleles might appear in the gene pool of a species.

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(2)
(Total 10 marks)

117. Vaccines are widely used to protect individuals from developing the symptoms of a range of
bacterial and viral infections. The vaccine contains one or more of the antigens found on the
pathogen. One such example is a vaccine for influenza (flu) that contains a cocktail of antigens
from viruses that cause this disease.

The graph below shows the changes in concentration of antibody in the blood plasma following
vaccination of an individual.
Concentration of antibodies in blood plasma / dm –3

60

50

40

30

20

10

0
5 10 15 20 25 30

Time after vaccination / days

vaccination
(a) Describe and explain the changes that occur in the concentration of antibodies in the
blood plasma following vaccination.

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(6)

(b) Mutations frequently occur in the flu virus resulting in a change in the antigens present on
its surface.

(i) Explain the meaning of the term mutation.

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(2)
 (ii) Suggest why the vaccine contains a cocktail of antigens.

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(2)
(Total 10 marks)

118. (a) Forensic entomology can be used to estimate the time of death of a mammal. Adult
female blowflies soon arrive to lay their eggs on the body and the blowfly life cycle
follows a precise sequence. The diagram below shows the sequence and times (in hours)
for each stage when the surrounding temperature is 21 °C.

(i) Using information in the diagram, calculate the total percentage of the life cycle
that a blowfly spends as a larva when the surrounding temperature is 21°C.

Answer .............................. %
(2)
 (ii) Temperature has an effect on the length of the blowfly lifecycle. Suggest an
explanation for the effect of temperature on the length of the blowfly lifecycle.

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(2)

(iii) Suggest two factors, other than temperature, that may affect the timing of the
blowfly lifecycle and lead to an incorrect estimate of the time of death.

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(3)

(b) Time of death can also be estimated by studying the degree of rigor mortis in muscles.
Describe how rigor mortis in muscles occurs.

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(3)
 (c) The process of succession occurs in plant communities as well as in a dead body.
Compare these two forms of succession.

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(3)
(Total 13 marks)

119. Tuberculosis (TB) is caused by the bacterium, Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

(a) The table below lists five structural features that may be found in bacteria and viruses.
Put a cross in the box if the structural feature is present.

Structural feature Bacteria Viruses

Mesosome

Capsid

Nucleic acid

Cytoplasm

Ribosome
(5)

(b) The table below shows the number of new TB cases recorded in 1994 and in 2004 from
four different geographical regions. These data exclude people who are HIV positive.

Year Number of new TB cases per 100 000 of the population

Africa Asia South America Europe
1994 148 629 98 48
2004 281 535 59 104
(i) Describe the trends shown by the data.

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(2)

(ii) HIV positive people were excluded from the data. If they had been included
suggest how the data would differ. Give an explanation for your answer.

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(3)
 (c) TB is increasing in some countries which have well-funded health services. Suggest two
reasons for this.

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(2)
(Total 12 marks)

120. Bacteriostatic and bactericidal antibiotics are effective against bacterial cells but leave
mammalian cells unharmed.

(a) (i) Distinguish between bacteriostatic and bactericidal antibiotics.

...........................................................................................................................

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(1)

(ii) Suggest why mammalian cells are unharmed by antibiotics.

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(2)
(b) Resistance to antibiotics is an increasingly severe problem around the world. More
hospital patients are contracting diseases which cannot be cured using available
antibiotics.

Suggest ways by which doctors and patients can help to prevent the further spread of
antibiotic resistance in bacteria.

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(3)

(c) Describe a procedure that you have used to investigate the effect of different antibiotics
on bacterial growth.

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(4)
(Total 10 marks)