Water
This property of water results from hydrogen bonds and allows small insects to walk on the surface.
What is surface tension?
How many valence electrons does carbon have available for bonding?
How many is four?
Monosaccharides are the building blocks of these larger carbohydrate molecules.
Polysaccharides
Proteins are polymers made of these monomer units.
Amino acids.
Name the two nucleic acids that store and transmit genetic information.
DNA and RNA
Name the type of bond within a single water molecule that holds hydrogen to oxygen.
What is a covalent bond?
Define "organic" as used in biology (one short sentence).
Organic molecules contain carbon-hydrogen bonds and form the basis of living organisms.
BONUS (CHECK YOUR TEXTBOOK): Give the general formula (empirical) for simple sugars/carbohydrates in textbook form.
— (–CH2O–)n 201 — (accept cellulose; starch)
How many common amino acids are used to build proteins? (TEXTBOOK: BONUS)
Twenty
List the three parts of a nucleotide.
Phosphate group, pentose sugar, nitrogenous base
Water resists temperature change because it has a high value for this thermal property (two-word term).
What is high heat capacity (or specific heat capacity)?
BONUS (CHECK YOUR TEXTBOOK): Name the process that links monomers into polymers and the complementary process that breaks them apart.
Dehydration synthesis (condensation); hydrolysis
Identify one structural polysaccharide in plants and one storage polysaccharide in plants.
— (accept cellulose; starch)
Which level of protein structure is defined by the linear sequence of amino acids?
Primary structure
BONUS: CHECK YOUR TEXTBOOK: In DNA, which base pairs with adenine? In RNA, which base replaces thymine?
In DNA, adenine pairs with thymine; in RNA, uracil replaces thymine so adenine pairs with uracil.
Explain why ice floats on liquid water in one sentence (focus on molecular structure/density).
Because ice forms a lattice that is less dense than liquid water, so solid water floats
Explain why carbon forms such a large variety of stable organic molecules (one or two sentences; mention bonding)
Carbon has four valence electrons allowing four covalent bonds, enabling diverse stable chains and rings.
What is a triglyceride made of? List the components.
(Triglyceride = glycerol + three fatty acids)
What's the difference between the tertiary and quaternary structure of a protein?
Answers may vary.
Describe two biological consequences of water’s polarity and hydrogen bonding.
(Sample) Polarity allows water to dissolve many solutes (important for transport); hydrogen bonding causes cohesion and high surface tension (important for capillary action).
Predict how replacing a carbon–carbon single bond with a carbon–carbon double bond in a fatty acid affects its shape and packing (one short explanation).
Double bonds introduce kinks in fatty acid chains, preventing tight packing and often lowering melting point (more liquid-like).
Contrast saturated and unsaturated fatty acids in terms of bonds and physical state at room temperature (brief).
Saturated: single C–C bonds, straighter chains, pack tightly, often solid at room temp; Unsaturated: one or more C=C (or C≡C), kinks, pack less tightly, often liquid (oils).