Introductory Microbiology Solved Exam Questions
Course Introduction
Introductory Microbiology explores the fundamental principles of microbiology, focusing on the structure, function, diversity, and roles of microorganisms. The course examines bacteria, viruses, fungi, and protists, highlighting their impact on human health, ecology, and biotechnology. Students will learn about microbial metabolism, genetics, growth, and control, as well as basic laboratory techniques for culturing and identifying microbes. The course also addresses the importance of microorganisms in disease, environmental processes, and industry, providing a broad understanding of their significance in everyday life.
Recommended Textbook
Living in a Microbial World 1st Edition by Bruce Hofkin
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208 Verified Questions
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Page 2
Chapter 1: Living in a Microbial World
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following are not composed of cells?
A) Bacteria and archaea
B) Fungi and protozoa
C) Viruses and prions
Answer: C
Q2) Why are control groups necessary in a proper scientific experiment?
Answer: In a proper experiment, the effect of the experimental variable, if any, is compared between the experimental group and the control group. Without the control group, in which the experimental variable was not manipulated, there would be no way to evaluate the effect of the experimental variable.
Q3) Those factors that are kept the same in the experimental group and the control group are called:
A) control variables.
B) experimental variables.
C) manipulated variables.
D) observed variables.
Answer: A
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Chapter 2: The Chemistry of Life
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Sample Questions
Q1) What factors determine if a substance will or will not dissolve in water?
Answer: Water is a highly polar molecule, because of the polar covalent bonds between oxygen and hydrogen atoms. These polar covalent bonds result in partial charges on each atom in a water molecule; partial negative on the oxygen and partial positive on the hydrogen atoms. These partial charges can attract charges, either partial or full, on other molecules, allowing the water to hydrogen bond with these charged molecules. Consequently, any molecule with charges (ionic compounds or compounds consisting of largely polar covalent bonds) will hydrogen bond with water, and the collective force of many hydrogen bonds causes the molecule to dissolve. Molecules that are composed of mainly nonpolar covalent bonds lack charges, and therefore cannot hydrogen bond with water. They therefore do not dissolve in water.
Q2) If an atom X has an atomic number of 18, then:
A) there are 18 protons.
B) there are 9 protons and 9 electrons.
C) there are 18 neutrons.
D) there are 9 protons and 9 neutrons.
E) it also has a mass number of 18.
Answer: A
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Page 4
Chapter 3: The Cell: Where Life Begins
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following extracellular structures allows some bacteria to resist phagocytosis by phagocytic cells?
A) capsule
B) fimbriae
C) sex pili
D) flagella
Answer: A
Q2) Bacteria which have a spherical shape are called ________.
A) bacilli
B) spirochetes
C) vibrio
D) spirilla
E) cocci
Answer: E
Q3) What is taxis as it applies to bacteria? What structure does bacteria that are capable of taxis possess?
Answer: Taxis refers to the ability of many bacteria to move toward favorable conditions (positive taxis) or away from unfavorable conditions (negative taxis). Only motile bacteria are capable of taxis. In an almost all cases, motile bacteria rely on flagella.
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Page 5
Chapter 4: A Field Guide to the Microorganisms
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Sample Questions
Q1) In which of the following ways are prions believed to differ from all other infectious agents?
A) Unlike any other infectious agents, they are acellular.
B) Unlike any other infectious agents, they can infect many different species of hosts.
C) Unlike any other infectious agents, are able to reproduce without any nucleic acid.
D) Prions appear to be unusual viruses that have both DNA and RNA.
E) Unlike other infectious agents, which are found only in specific host tissues, prions have the ability to infect any tissue in a host's body.
Q2) How are rRNA genes used to deduce evolutionary relationships?
Q3) The feeding and reproducing stage of many protozoa is known as a:
A) trophozoite.
B) cyst.
C) vector.
D) protista.
E) mastigophora.
Q4) What is different about the synthesis stage in a plus- and a minus-strand RNA virus?
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Page 6
Chapter 5: The Microbiology of History and the History of Microbiology
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following early contributors to the development of microbiology as a science is not paired up properly with his or her accomplishment?
A) Louis Pasteur: demonstrated that contaminating bacteria were responsible for wine spoilage
B) Joseph Lister: developed aseptic technique
C) Florence Nightingale: introduced the idea of sanitation to hospitals
D) Ignaz Semmelweis: was the first to show that a specific microbe could cause a specific disease
E) Robert Koch: developed pure culture technique
Q2) What is the danger associated with agricultural monocultures?
Q3) Why is a large population of hosts more important for the maintenance of a "crowd disease" than it is for other types of diseases?
Q4) A serious disease outbreak that affects a large portion of the world is called a(n): A) epidemic.
B) pandemic.
C) endemic.
D) zoonosis.
E) nosocomial infection.
Page 7
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Chapter 6: Microbial Genetics
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Sample Questions
Q1) In the lac-operon, under which of the following conditions will the repressor protein be bound to its binding site?
A) when the environment contains abundant lactose
B) when the environment is very low in lactose
C) when the inducer is bound to the repressor
D) when RNA polymerase is most able to bind to the promoter
E) when the structural genes of the operon are being transcribed at a maximum rate
Q2) The term used to describe the orientation of the two strands of DNA is:
A) polarity.
B) complementary.
C) antiparallel.
D) 5<sup>' </sup>to 3.<sup>' </sup>
E) forked.
Q3) Explain how RNA differs in structure from DNA.
Q4) How does "proofreading" by DNA polymerase occur during DNA replication?
Q5) Identify and describe three distinct ways in which genetic recombination occurs in bacteria.
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Chapter 7: Metabolism and Growth
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Sample Questions
Q1) If the final electron acceptor is not present, which of the following still occurs?
A) the pumping of protons across a membrane
B) the production of ATP by the ATP synthase complex
C) the final oxidation of biological molecules in the Krebs cycle
D) the release of electrons to components of the electron transport chain by NADH and FADH<sub>2</sub>
E) fermentation
Q2) Bacteria that grow well only at very low temperatures are termed:
A) extreme thermophiles.
B) mesophiles.
C) thermophiles.
D) psychrophiles.
E) psychotolerant.
Q3) Describe how ATP is produced in electron transport.
Q4) When cells catabolize biological molecules for the purposes of ATP production, energy in the biological molecule is released in a large number of small steps, rather than in a single large step. Why is this necessary?
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Chapter 8: Microbial Evolution: the Origin and Diversity of Life
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following points is not part of the theory of natural selection?
A) Under ideal conditions, all populations can grow exponentially if all individuals survive and reproduce.
B) As environmental resources become limited, some individuals within a population are more likely to reproduce than others.
C) Individuals within a population are not genetically identical.
D) Those with a genetic makeup that results in the best adaptation to a particular set of environmental conditions are those most likely to reproduce. They will then pass on genes for these adaptations to their offspring.
E) Specific environmental conditions can cause specific favorable mutations to occur, resulting in better adaptation to those environmental conditions.
Q2) We might expect virulence of a particular human pathogen to decrease:
A) when opportunities for transmission are limited.
B) when opportunities for transmission are abundant.
C) when animal reservoirs for the pathogen are scarce.
D) in very large human populations, such as a large city.
E) when it uses insect vectors for transmission.
Q3) Explain the rationale for the "RNA world" hypothesis.
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Chapter 9: An Ecologists Guide to Microbiology
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following statements about competition is true?
A) Compared to plants or animals, competition between microorganisms is a rare event.
B) The principle of competitive exclusion suggests that two organisms in competition will eventually reach a stable equilibrium, where both organisms can coexist and survive.
C) A commensial relationship is an example of competition.
D) If you take an environmental sample, and find numerous microbial species within that sample, it suggests that none of these species are in competition with each other.
E) Compared to animals and plants, the resolution of competition between microorganisms is rapid.
Q2) In aquatic environments, the ________ zone represents the part of the environment where sunlight reaches the bottom.
A) photic zone
B) littoral zone
C) profundal zone
D) benthic zone
E) pelagic zone
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Chapter 10: The Nature of Disease: a Pathogens Perspective
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Sample Questions
Q1) For a given pathogen:
A) the ID<sub>50 </sub>will always be lower than the LD<sub>50.</sub>
B) the ID<sub>50</sub> will always be higher than the LD<sub>50.</sub>
C) the ID<sub>50</sub> and the LD<sub>50</sub> will always be equal.
D) the ID<sub>50 </sub>may be lower or higher than the LD<sub>50.</sub>
Q2) Which of the following is false about exotoxins?
A) Part of the exotoxin called the "A subunit" binds to receptors on the surface of certain host cells.
B) The combined exotoxin (both the A & B subunits) enter the host cell by endocytosis.
C) They may be produced by either Gram-positive or Gram-negative bacteria.
D) They are generally more toxic than endotoxins at low concentration.
E) They are composed of protein.
Q3) In terms of how a pathogen might affect a host, which of the following is the correct sequence of events?
A) contamination » disease » infection
B) disease » contamination » infection
C) infection » contamination » disease
D) infection » disease » contamination
E) contamination » infection » disease
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Page 12
Chapter 11: Host Defense
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which antibody type is usually produced in the greatest amount during a humoral reponse?
A) IgA
B) IgD
C) IgM
D) IgE
E) IgG
Q2) Which of the following immune system structures and their associated function is not correct?
A) thymus: maturation of T-cells
B) lymph node: generation of adaptive immune responses in tissues
C) spleen: generation of adaptive immune responses in the blood
D) liver: maturation of B-cells
E) skin: a barrier to entry
Q3) Describe how cells of the innate immune system activate the adaptive immune system under certain circumstances.
Q4) How does HIV reduce immune function?
Q5) In what way can the fever response be used to illustrate the point that response to pathogens can both be protective and harmful?
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Chapter 12: Control of Microbial Growth
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following most accurately describes the activity of acyclovir?
A) It prevents uncoating by viral particles.
B) It is phosphorylated by a viral enzyme, producing a false nucleotide, which is then incorporated into replicating viral DNA.
C) It prevents the release of newly replicated influenza viral particles from an infected cell.
D) It interferes with the activity of the viral enzyme reverse transcriptase.
E) It binds to and inhibits the viral protease enzyme, which cleaves large viral proteins into the smaller proteins needed for viral assembly.
Q2) What is a nosocomial infection?
A) an infection contracted at one's place of work, or at school
B) an infection contracted from an animal
C) an infection contracted from improperly prepared food
D) an infection contracted during a stay in the hospital
E) an infection that a health care worker contracts from a patient
Q3) In what situations would UV radiation be an appropriate method for microbial control?
Q4) How does stopping an antibiotic prescription prematurely contribute to the development of drug resistance?
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Chapter 13: Epidemiology: Who,
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Sample Questions
Q1) When a new disease appears, which of the following is developed first?
A) a case-control study
B) personal characteristics of the disease
C) place characteristics of the disease
D) time characteristics of the disease
E) a case definition
Q2) Into which category of emergent diseases would dengue be placed?
A) Category 1: invasion of a new host population by a known pathogen
B) Category 2: appearance of a completely new, previously unknown pathogen
C) Category 3: association of a well-known disease with a new pathogen
D) Category 4: increased virulence, or a renewed problem, with a well-known but previously less virulent or well-controlled pathogen
Q3) Which of the following pathogens would most likely be used as a bioterrorism agent?
A) Pathogen A: an obligate anaerobe
B) Pathogen B: an obligate aerobe
C) Pathogen C: a Gram-positive bacterial species
D) Pathogen D: a RNA virus
E) Pathogen E: a spore-former
Q4) How can a vaccine program prevent epidemics?
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Chapter 14: The Future Is Here: Microorganisms and Biotechnology
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Sample Questions
Q1) The sequencing of the human genome has shown us that:
A) the number of genes in the human genome is much smaller than previously thought.
B) the number of genes in the human genome is much larger than previously thought.
C) the number of genes in the human genome is about the same number as previously thought.
D) the DNA of humans is much different from that of even our closest nonhuman ancestors.
Q2) Southern blotting can be used to:
A) insert donor DNA into recipient DNA.
B) determine if a specific gene is present in a DNA molecule.
C) separate DNA fragments based on size.
D) make many copies of a particular gene.
E) determine the exact nucleotide sequence in a DNA molecule.
Q3) What is the polymerase chain reaction? Briefly state how it works.
Q4) What exactly is a DNA library? What is a genomic library?
Q5) One of the concerns about genetically modified plants is how they might affect wild plants. In what way? Why is this worrisome?
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Chapter 15: Guess Whos Coming to Dinner: Microorganisms and
Food
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Sample Questions
Q1) Probiotics are:
A) any microbially fermented food.
B) food items that are produced by aerobic bacteria.
C) hormones that are produced by bacteria.
D) products that contain living microorganisms, thought to be beneficial.
E) antibiotics added to animal feed to encourage more rapid growth.
Q2) In what way is the production of vinegar different from the production of the fermented food products discussed in this chapter?
Q3) Provide a biochemical explanation for why bread rises during its production.
Q4) Microbial fermentation of food products occurs when the microorganisms are allowed to grow:
A) in an anaerobic environment.
B) in an aerobic environment.
C) in an acidic environment.
D) at low temperatures.
E) at high temperatures.
Q5) Microbial fermentation only occurs under certain environmental conditions. Why, in terms of metabolism, do these organisms ferment under such conditions?
Page 17
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Chapter 16: Better Living With Microorganisms: Industrial and Applied Microbiology
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Q1) What exactly is the biopesticide Bt? Why is this product, which kills garden pests, not a danger to humans, pets, or other animals?
Q2) Microorganisms to be used commercially usually are developed in a series of defined steps. Which of the following has those steps in the correct order?
A) laboratory flask » pilot plant fermentor » laboratory fermentor » industrial fermentor
B) laboratory fermentor » laboratory flask » pilot plant fermentor » industrial fermentor
C) industrial fermentor » pilot plant fermentor » laboratory fermentor » labortory flask
D) laboratory flask » laboratory fermentor » pilot plant fermentor » industrial fermentor
E) pilot plant fermentor » labortory flask » industrial fermentor » laboratory fermentor
Q3) Why does compost tend to heat up over time? Why is it beneficial to periodically turn the compost?
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