1. Which of the Following Properties Are NOT Found in Plasmids

1. Which of the following properties are NOT found in plasmids:

Choose one answer.

a. a defined copy number

b. a protein coat

c. a specific size

d. the potential for transfer to other host bacteria

2. Which ONE of the following is not a plasmid encoded property:

Choose one answer.

a. antibiotic resistance

b. virus production

c. toxin production

d. fertility

3. E. coli is a good host for cloning because:

Choose one answer.

a. its proteins can contain disulphide bonds

b. it can remove introns

c. it can glycosylate proteins

d. it is cheap and easy to grow

4. Which ONE of the following DNA delivery methods is most commonly used for the genetic engineering of dicotyledonous plants?

Choose one answer.

a. Virus-mediated transformation

b. Electroporation

c. Agrobacterium-mediated transformation

d. Microparticle bombardment (“biolistics”)

e. Microinjection

f. Vortexing with glass beads

5. Which FOUR of the following six statements are true for the BioBrick assembly method)?

Choose at least one answer.

a. The joining of any DNA parts always involves the same cloning strategy

b. A UCL team is taking part in iGEM 2011

c. BioBrick parts available from the Parts Registry are compatible with a wide range of bacterial and eukaryotic chassis

d. A drawback of the BioBrick strategy is that unwanted restriction enzyme sites may have to be removed when creating new parts

e. The assembly process allows the joining of many parts in a single step

f. A DNA ‘scar’ is formed at the junction of two connected parts

6. Which THREE of the following are true about artemisinin - the first commercial product of synthetic biology?

Choose at least one answer.

a. Yeast genetic engineering was used by Craig Venter to make artemisinic acid (a non-toxic precursor of artemisinin).

b. Artemisinin is a powerful anti-malarial drug

c. Bill Gates is a vigorous opponent of this synthetic biology technology

d. Artemisinin is traditionally isolated from snake venom

e. A key enzyme in the biosynthesis is amorphadiene synthase

f. The genetic engineering involved manipulation of the isoprenoid pathway

7. Which THREE of the following statements are true regarding DNA bar-codes?

Choose at least one answer.

a. They include systematic or taxonomic information

b. They can identify cryptic species

c. They are machine-readable digital tags

d. They contain informative sequence differences

e. only mtDNA is ever used

f. They are good for resolving very deep phylogenetic relationships

8. Which THREE of the following six statements are true as to why mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is useful for phylogenetic studies?

Choose at least one answer.

a. mtDNA amplifies easily during PCR

b. mtDNA has a low copy number

c. mtDNA contains lots of informative sites providing shared unique characters to reconstruct phylogenies

d. mtDNA has a higher rate of base substitution than most nuclear DNA genes

e. mtDNA is protected by histones

f. mtDNA undergoes recombination

9. Which THREE of the following six statements are NOT true regarding the utility of nuclear DNA in phylogenetic studies?

Choose at least one answer.

a. nuclear DNA (e.g. 18S) is useful for the DNA-bar-coding of Eukaryote

b. nuclear DNA suffers from introgression

c. nuclear DNA is useful for investigating deep time

d. nuclear DNA is widely used for DNA bar-coding of prokaryotes

e. nuclear DNA provides an independent dataset from mtDNA

f. nuclear DNA data, such as AFLPs, are unable to resolve rapidly evolving radiations

10. Which THREE of the following six statements are true:

Choose at least one answer.

a. GFP was originally found in algae

b. CFP stands for Coral Fluorescent Protein

c. GFP stands for Green Fluorescent Protein

d. The original GFP gene has been artificially mutated to produce other colours

e. GFP binds strongly and specifically to actin

f. Genes such as GFP can replace a native coding sequence to act as a reporter protein

11. Which TWO of the following six statements are NOT true:

Choose at least one answer.

a. Biotin can act as a hapten.

b. Biotin (Vitamin B7) is specifically recognised (bound to) by streptavidin.

c. Digoxygenin is a hapten derived from the death cap mushroom (Amanita phalloides)

d. Nucleic acids labelled with radioactive isotopes such as 32P can be specifically recognised by antibodies.

e. Fluorescein is a fluorescent hapten

f. Haptens are small molecules recognised by antibodies

12. Which THREE of the following six statements are true:

Choose at least one answer.

a. The nucleotides Adenine and Thymine form a stable complementary base pair

b. The nucleotides Adenine and Uracil form a stable complementary base pair

c. The nucleotides Guanine and Cytosine form a stable complementary base pair

d. The nucleotides Cytosine and Uracil form a stable complementary base pair

e. The nucleotides Guanine and Adenine form a stable complementary base pair

f. The nucleotides Uracil and Thymine form a stable complementary base pair

13. In DNA fingerprinting the usual marker of choice is a VNTR. What does VNTR stand for:

Choose one answer.

a. Variable Nucleotide Tandem Repeat

b. Variable Number Trinucleotide Repeat

c. Variable Number Tandem Repeat

d. Virtual Number Triplet Repeat

e. Virtual Nucleotide Tandem Region

f. Variable Number Tandem Region

14. Which one of the following statements is false:

Choose one answer.

a. The repeat unit in a microsatellite is usually between 2 and 6 bases long

b. Y chromosome variation can be useful in forensic cases of sexual assult

c. Microsatellites are usually typed by PCR and size fractionation in an automated sequencer

d. If a VNTR has three alleles, there are six possible genotypes

e. One of the main mechanisms of microsatellite mutation is slipped-strand mispairing

f. One of the main mechanisms of minisatellite mutation is unequal crossing over

g. Tetranucleotide repeat microsatellites can occur in the coding regions of genes

h. The repeat unit in a minisatellite is usually between 11 and 60 bases long

15. Which three of the following six are reasons why autosomal genetic variation is generally preferred in DNA fingerprinting:

Choose at least one answer.

a. Y chromosomes are too small to contain any useful variation

b. Autosomal DNA has a higher mutation rate

c. Autosomal DNA lasts longer at crime sceens

d. Each autosomal locus has two copies

e. Most of our genetic material is on autosomes and so they contain more genetic variation.

f. Most autosomal loci are unlinked

16. Which three of the following six statements about Solexa sequencing (Illumina) are true:

Choose at least one answer.

a. DNA sequences to be read are amplified by 'bridge PCR'

b. PCR amplification occures in microreactors

c. Sequencing occures on a 'flow cell'

d. Solexa sequencing has a lower error rate than Sanger sequencing

e. Flouresecntly-labelled reversible terminators are used

f. Solexa sequencing produces longer fragement reads than 454 sequencing

17. Which TWO of the following six describes burial environments that are most likely to result in long-term DNA preservation?

Choose at least one answer.

a. Almost any environment - the complexities of DNA preservation are not well understood

b. It doesn't really matter, as long as the environment is stable

c. Temperate environments, such as an oak forest

d. Cold environments, such as deep caves or permafrost

e. Very dry conditions, such as deserts or gypsum caves

f. Freshwater lakes

18. Ancient DNA extraction techniques tend to differ from those used in regular DNA extraction. Which TWO of the following six statements are correct?

Choose at least one answer.

a. High concentrations of detergents are used, to reduce bacterial contamination

b. Methods are designed to reduce the effects of DNA damage

c. The differences are cosmetic and due to personal preference

d. Ancient DNA extractions are much faster than regular methods, in order to minimise loss of DNA

e. Methods should remove any chemical residues from treatments applied in museum storage

f. Methods are designed to remove soil compoundsthat may interfere with downstream manipulation

19. Next generation sequencing (NGS) methods are beginning to be used in ancient DNA analyses. Which TWO of the following six statements are correct?

Choose at least one answer.

a. NGS allows better estimation of the amount of damaged DNA in a sample

b. Because NGS methods generally give short sequence lengths, they are not suitable for ancient DNA

c. NGS approaches are too expensive to use in ancient DNA projects

d. Bacterial cloning is still seen as the "gold standard" for ancient DNA analyses

e. Many ancient DNA extraction methods are not compatible with NGS techniques.

f. NGS methods can show DNA contamination, which is useful for ancient DNA projects

20. Two of the main 'Next Generation Sequencing' technologies are 454 sequencing (Roche) and Solexa sequencing (Illumina). Which three of the following six features are common to these two methods:

Choose at least one answer.

a. Both methods require a ligation step

b. Both methods require a restriction endonuclease

c. Both methods were developed by scientists while under the influence of strong hallucinogenic drugs

d. Both methods require nanopores

e. Both technologies are massively parallel

f. Both methods sequence 'by synthesis'

21. The first synthetic bacterial genome was based on the genome of which species?

Choose one answer.

a. Escherichia coli

b. Bacillus subtilis

c. Agrobacterium tumefaciens

d. Staphylococcus aureus

e. Haemophilus influenzae

f. Mycoplasma genitalium