~Week 4:PASS Facilitator Info~

Oil Spill Lunch

Bioremediation is a process by which certain bacteria are used to degrade hazardous substances in the environment. Invite students to research the process of bioremediation as it has been applied to the treatment of oil spills.

Perhaps a couple of base questions to get the session kicked off before they jump into groups:

Can anyone recall an oil spill in particular?

Why is an oil spill so detrimental?

What effect does it have at a macro level versus a micro level and how would one affect the other?

What other means of dealing with oil spills are currently available?

Materials:

  • Butcher’s paper and textas
  • Articles relating to the topic
  • Pre-warned to bring their Campbell Texts

Have the class grouped into four groups and each receives a question to work on which will then be presented to the class. Get each group to outline their response but come up with two concluding questions for the rest of the class which relates to their presentation.Feel free to encourage use of the white board. The concluding questions are to keep the class listening and can be anything relative to their specific topic so it could be based on something they mentioned in their presentation or a broad ethical question or honors project worthy?

Here goes…

  1. How does this natural process work?
  1. What are the growth requirements for the bacteria used?
  1. What conditions limit their population growth?
  1. What problems may arise if these populations of bacteria increase in the environment?

Exam Questions from 2006 BIOL1102:

36. Which of the following statements is false? Viruses…

1)Only replicate intracellularly

2)Exist extracellularly in the environment

3)Always cause damage to the host

4)Can affect the evolution of all organisms

5)Can sometimes become part of the host genome

  1. The process of horizontal gene transfer from one bacterial cell to another that is mediated by self-transmissible plasmids is called:

1)Transduction

2)Transformation

3)Conjugation

4)All of the above

5)None of the above

  1. Which of the following is true about viruses?

1)Some of the most deadly viruses of humans arise by ‘jumping the specie barrier’ between plants and humans

2)A single virus particle contains both DNA and mRNA

3)Even small virus particles are visible with light microscopes

4)Viruses are not classified as cells

5)Animal viruses gain entry to host cells by secreting enzymes that digest proteins in the host cell membrane

  1. What is the function of reverse transcriptase in HIV?

1)It hydrolyses the host cell’s DNA

2)It converts host cell RNA into viral DNA.

3)It uses viral RNA as a template for DNA synthesis.

4)It translates viral RNA as a template for making complementary RNA strands.

  1. A sequence of DNA copies itself independently of the rest of the chromosomes and inserts its copies in alternative locations within the genome. This DNA sequence is most probably a:

1)Transposon

2)Self-transmissible plasmid

3)Ribosomal RNA gene

4)Virus

5)Pseudogene

  1. An operon can be defined as:

1)Horizontal transmission of plant viruses

2)Bacterial resistance to antibiotics

3)How genes move between homologous regions of DNA

4)The mechanism of viral attachment to a host cell

5)The coordinated control of gene expression in bacteria

  1. Genetic diversity in bacterial populations never results from:

1)Transduction

2)Transformation

3)Conjugation

4)Meiosis

5)Mutation

  1. Which of the following characteristics or processes is common to both bacteria and viruses?

1)Binary fission

2)Plasmid

3)Genetic material of nucleic acid

4)Mitosis

5)conjugation