Explain the process of biological magnification. Where in the food chain do humans fit in, and how might biological magnification affect us?
What will be an ideal response?
Biological magnification is the concentration of toxins as they move up the food chain. Because predators must consume many prey items to survive, they absorb the toxins ingested by each of those prey organisms. The longest-lived animals are most susceptible because they have the most time to concentrate toxins. Humans are at very high risk, especially individuals who place themselves at the top of the food chain by eating meat. Toxins are stored in our fat, and nursing mothers secrete then into breast milk. (Breastfeeding is nevertheless a much healthier choice than bottle feeding.)
You might also like to view...
Which of the following is expected to reduce competition among individuals?
A. resource partitioning B. the disappearance of a predator from an area C. a shortened mating season D. a decrease in the carrying capacity of an environment E. destruction of habitat space
Trichomonas vaginalis is an unusual eukaryote in that it
A. has chloroplasts. B. lacks mitochondria. C. has flagella. D. lacks a nuclear membrane.
What is a likely explanation for why nothing happened in your experiment?
Sometimes the most practical way to do an experiment is not to perform it in an animal, but to look at cell responses in culture. Cells from mice, humans, and other mammals have been used to establish cell culture lines that have been very important for research. You are studying a novel water-soluble mouse hormone. You know cell culture can be a practical model to reveal protein function, so you apply the hormone to yeast cells, but nothing happens. A. Yeast have a cell wall, so the molecule cannot pass through the cell membrane as it would in mice. B. Water-soluble hormones are lipids, not proteins. C. You need to apply the hormone in large amounts to see an effect. D. Yeast may lack the receptor required for the hormone to act. Clarify Question What is the key concept addressed by the question? What type of thinking is required? Gather Content What do you already know about hormones? What other information is related to the question? Choose Answer Given what you now know, what information is most likely to produce the correct answer? Reflect on Process Did your problem-solving process lead you to the correct answer? If not, where did the process break down or lead you astray? How can you revise your approach to produce a more desirable result?
In which type of population distribution would
plot sampling be most accurate?
a. clumping b. uniform c. random d. random and clumping e. uniform and clumping