NY Regents Life Science: Biology Exam Flashcards

Q: How many cards are in this NY Regents biology set?

This set includes 50 original active-recall cards covering the local Life Science: Biology and Living Environment transition topics: structure and function, matter and energy, ecology, inheritance, evolution, Earth systems, investigations, and engineering reasoning.

Q: Do these cards copy released Regents questions?

No. The cards use original wording. The local question bank was used only to infer common concept coverage and traps, such as energy flow vs. matter cycling, individual organisms vs. populations, and claim-evidence-reasoning.

Q: What should students practice beyond vocabulary?

Students should practice interpreting graphs, tables, models, food webs, pedigrees, and experimental designs, then linking the evidence to a biological mechanism.

Q: What are common Regents biology traps?

Common traps include saying organisms evolve during a lifetime, confusing mitosis with meiosis, treating energy as recycled, ignoring control variables, and choosing answers that do not match the evidence in a graph or table.

Q: Are the required investigations included in the final score?

Required Life Science: Biology Investigations are required for admission as locally determined, but investigation scores are not reported to the State or included in the final Regents score.

Question 1

How does structure relate to function in living things?

Accepted Answer

A biological structure is shaped for what it does. A receptor's shape affects signaling, a red blood cell's shape supports transport, and a root hair's shape increases absorption.

Question 2

Why do different body cells have different functions if they contain the same DNA?

Accepted Answer

Most body cells contain the same genome, but different genes are turned on or off. Different gene expression leads to different proteins and specialized cell functions.

Question 3

What is homeostasis?

Accepted Answer

Homeostasis is maintaining a stable internal environment despite external change. It depends on monitoring conditions and responding when values move away from a normal range.

Question 4

Negative feedback vs. positive feedback: what is the difference?

Accepted Answer

Negative feedback reverses a change and supports stability, such as insulin lowering blood glucose. Positive feedback amplifies a change until an endpoint, such as contractions during birth.

Question 5

Why do enzymes speed up cellular reactions?

Accepted Answer

Enzymes lower activation energy by helping reactants fit and react. Their shape matters, so high heat or extreme pH can reduce enzyme function.

Question 6

What happens to an animal cell placed in pure water?

Accepted Answer

Water moves into the cell by osmosis because the outside solution is hypotonic. Without a cell wall, the cell can swell and burst.

Question 7

How do vaccines help the immune system respond faster later?

Accepted Answer

Vaccines expose the immune system to a safe antigen, causing memory cells to form. Later exposure triggers a faster, stronger immune response.

Question 8

What is the main purpose of mitosis in multicellular organisms?

Accepted Answer

Mitosis produces genetically identical body cells for growth, repair, and replacement. It preserves chromosome number in the daughter cells.

Question 9

Photosynthesis stores energy in what form?

Accepted Answer

Photosynthesis converts light energy into chemical energy stored in glucose. Carbon dioxide and water become glucose and oxygen in chloroplasts.

Question 10

Cellular respiration releases energy for what molecule?

Accepted Answer

Cellular respiration breaks down food molecules to make ATP, the short-term energy carrier used for cell work.

Question 11

Matter cycling vs. energy flow: what is the key distinction?

Accepted Answer

Matter atoms are recycled through ecosystems, such as carbon and nitrogen cycles. Energy flows one way, entering mostly as sunlight and leaving as heat.

Question 12

Why does available energy decrease at higher trophic levels?

Accepted Answer

Organisms use much of the energy they take in for metabolism, movement, growth, and heat loss. Only a fraction becomes biomass available to the next level.

Question 13

What do arrows in a food web show?

Accepted Answer

Arrows show the direction of energy transfer, from the organism being eaten to the organism that eats it. They do not point toward the food source.

Question 14

Why are decomposers essential in ecosystems?

Accepted Answer

Decomposers break down dead organisms and wastes, returning matter to the environment. Without them, nutrients would remain locked in dead biomass.

Question 15

How does exercise connect respiration and circulation?

Accepted Answer

Working muscles need more oxygen and glucose and produce more carbon dioxide. Faster breathing and circulation help deliver materials and remove wastes.

Question 16

What is carrying capacity?

Accepted Answer

Carrying capacity is the population size an environment can support over time with available resources and limiting factors. It can change when conditions change.

Question 17

What is a limiting factor?

Accepted Answer

A limiting factor is any biotic or abiotic condition that restricts population growth, such as food, water, space, disease, predators, or nesting sites.

Question 18

Why does biodiversity increase ecosystem stability?

Accepted Answer

Greater biodiversity provides more roles, genetic variation, and alternate pathways in food webs. A diverse ecosystem is often more resilient after disturbance.

Question 19

Predation, competition, and mutualism: what changes?

Accepted Answer

Predation benefits the predator and harms prey. Competition harms both by using the same limited resource. Mutualism benefits both interacting species.

Question 20

Why can an invasive species spread quickly?

Accepted Answer

It may lack natural predators, face little competition, reproduce rapidly, or use resources efficiently. Its spread can reduce biodiversity and alter food webs.

Question 21

How can nutrient runoff lower dissolved oxygen in water?

Accepted Answer

Runoff can cause algal blooms. When algae die, decomposers use oxygen while breaking them down, leaving less dissolved oxygen for aquatic organisms.

Question 22

What does ecological succession describe?

Accepted Answer

Succession is the gradual change in community composition after disturbance or on new surfaces. Species replace one another as conditions change.

Question 23

How should you read a population graph before choosing an answer?

Accepted Answer

Identify axes, units, trend, peaks, and timing. Then connect the pattern to a cause such as resource limits, disturbance, migration, or disease.

Question 24

What is the relationship between DNA, genes, and proteins?

Accepted Answer

DNA contains genes. Genes are instructions for making RNA and proteins. Proteins help produce traits by building structures, enzymes, and signals.

Question 25

Transcription vs. translation: what is made in each process?

Accepted Answer

Transcription makes RNA from a DNA template. Translation reads mRNA codons at a ribosome to assemble a chain of amino acids into a protein.

Question 26

Mitosis vs. meiosis: what is the outcome?

Accepted Answer

Mitosis makes identical body cells with the same chromosome number. Meiosis makes genetically varied gametes with half the chromosome number.

Question 27

Why does meiosis increase genetic variation?

Accepted Answer

Crossing over exchanges chromosome segments, and independent assortment shuffles homologous chromosomes into gametes. Fertilization adds another source of variation.

Question 28

Genotype vs. phenotype: what is the difference?

Accepted Answer

Genotype is the allele combination. Phenotype is the observable trait or function, which can be influenced by genotype, environment, and gene expression.

Question 29

What does a Punnett square show and not show?

Accepted Answer

It shows possible offspring genotypes and expected probabilities from parent alleles. It does not guarantee the exact outcome for a small number of offspring.

Question 30

What is nondisjunction?

Accepted Answer

Nondisjunction is a chromosome-separation error during meiosis. It can produce gametes with extra or missing chromosomes.

Question 31

Somatic mutation vs. gamete mutation: which can be inherited?

Accepted Answer

A mutation in a body cell affects that individual but is usually not inherited. A mutation in a gamete can be passed to offspring.

Question 32

Why can identical genes produce different traits in different environments?

Accepted Answer

Environmental conditions can affect gene expression and development. Traits often result from interaction between genes and environment, not genes alone.

Question 33

What is natural selection?

Accepted Answer

Natural selection is differential survival and reproduction caused by heritable variation. Traits that improve reproductive success can become more common in a population.

Question 34

Do individual organisms evolve?

Accepted Answer

No. Individuals may survive, die, or change during life, but evolution is a change in heritable trait frequencies in a population across generations.

Question 35

What makes a trait an adaptation?

Accepted Answer

An adaptation is an inherited trait that improves survival or reproduction in a particular environment. A trait can be helpful in one environment and harmful in another.

Question 36

How does antibiotic or pesticide resistance evolve?

Accepted Answer

Some individuals already have heritable resistance. Treatment kills susceptible individuals, resistant survivors reproduce, and the resistance trait becomes more common.

Question 37

What evidence can support common ancestry?

Accepted Answer

Shared DNA sequences, homologous structures, embryological patterns, fossils, and consistent branching patterns in phylogenetic trees can support common ancestry.

Question 38

What is genetic drift?

Accepted Answer

Genetic drift is random change in allele frequencies, strongest in small populations. Bottlenecks and founder events can reduce genetic diversity by chance.

Question 39

How can geographic isolation lead to speciation?

Accepted Answer

Separated populations stop interbreeding and face different mutations, selection pressures, and drift. Over time they may become reproductively isolated species.

Question 40

How does photosynthesis connect life to Earth's atmosphere?

Accepted Answer

Photosynthesis removes carbon dioxide and releases oxygen. Over long time scales, photosynthetic organisms changed atmospheric oxygen levels and carbon cycling.

Question 41

How does combustion affect the carbon cycle?

Accepted Answer

Combustion moves carbon from fuels or biomass into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide, increasing the atmospheric carbon pool.

Question 42

Why can climate change shift species distributions?

Accepted Answer

Temperature, precipitation, seasons, and habitat conditions affect survival and reproduction. Species may move, decline, or expand as suitable conditions shift.

Question 43

What is a feedback loop in an Earth-life system?

Accepted Answer

A feedback loop occurs when a change triggers responses that either reduce the change or amplify it. Biology, climate, carbon, and habitat can interact in loops.

Question 44

Independent vs. dependent variable: how do you identify each?

Accepted Answer

The independent variable is changed or compared by the investigator. The dependent variable is measured as the response and is often shown on the y-axis.

Question 45

Why are controlled variables important?

Accepted Answer

Controlled variables keep other conditions constant so the observed effect can be linked more confidently to the independent variable.

Question 46

What makes evidence reliable in a biology investigation?

Accepted Answer

Reliable evidence comes from appropriate controls, repeated trials, accurate measurements, enough data, and methods that reduce bias or random error.

Question 47

What should a claim-evidence-reasoning response include?

Accepted Answer

It should state a claim, cite specific data or observations as evidence, and explain the biological mechanism that connects the evidence to the claim.

Question 48

How do you evaluate a biological model?

Accepted Answer

Ask what the model represents well, what it leaves out, what assumptions it makes, and whether its predictions match data.

Question 49

Criteria vs. constraints in an ecosystem solution: what is the difference?

Accepted Answer

Criteria define what a successful solution should accomplish. Constraints are limits such as cost, time, materials, safety, or effects on other species.

Question 50

Why do engineering solutions in ecology often involve trade-offs?

Accepted Answer

A solution can improve one outcome while creating costs or side effects elsewhere. Strong answers compare benefits, constraints, and evidence for each option.

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