What makes a cell in a complex multicellular organism specialised?
Its features are suited to a particular function, for example its shape or the abundance or arrangement of its cell structures.
AQA GCSE Combined Science: Trilogy (8464) — Biology — Foundation · 4.8
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What makes a cell in a complex multicellular organism specialised?
Its features are suited to a particular function, for example its shape or the abundance or arrangement of its cell structures.
How should you explain a specialised cell’s adaptation?
Link a specific feature of the cell to how it helps the cell perform its function.
What is an adaptation?
An inherited feature that makes an organism better suited to its environment and can increase its reproductive success there.
What are the three types of adaptation, and what does each involve?
How can natural selection make a population better adapted over generations?
It can increase the frequency of alleles associated with advantageous features.
How do adaptation and selection relate to evolution and the diversity of living organisms?
Together, they contribute to evolution and the diversity of living organisms.
What is a cell?
A basic living unit.
How are new cells produced?
By the division of existing cells.
How are cells, tissues, organs and organ systems organised in a multicellular organism?
Groups of cells work together to form tissues; different tissues work together to form organs; organs work together to form organ systems.
What is an organism?
An individual living thing made up of coordinated parts.
How can genetic variation affect adaptation within a population?
Some individuals carry alleles that make them better adapted to their environment than others.
What is the consequence of producing more offspring than can survive?
A struggle for survival, including competition for resources.
Why are better-adapted individuals more likely to pass their alleles to the next generation?
They are more likely to survive and reproduce.
How can natural selection affect the frequency of advantageous alleles over generations?
Alleles associated with advantageous inherited characteristics can become more common in the population.
What determines a biological molecule’s shape and chemical properties?
The types and arrangement of its atoms.
How do a biological molecule’s shape and chemical properties influence its function?
They influence its interactions with other molecules, enabling it to perform roles in living organisms.
How can a change in a biological molecule’s structure change its function?
It can change the molecule’s interactions with other molecules.
What is a population in ecology?
Organisms of one species living in the same area at the same time.
What is a community in ecology?
The populations of different species living and interacting in an area.
How do humans interact with populations and communities?
Humans depend on other organisms and affect them through their activities.
What is photosynthesis?
Green plants and algae use captured light energy to make organic compounds from carbon dioxide and water.
What happens to carbon from carbon dioxide during photosynthesis?
It is fixed into organic molecules.
What supplies hydrogen for the organic molecules made in photosynthesis?
Water.
What gas is released as a product of photosynthesis?
Oxygen.
Why are the organic compounds produced by photosynthesis important to life on Earth?
They provide a foundation for life on Earth.
What is cellular respiration?
A sequence of chemical reactions in cells that uses organic compounds as fuels and releases energy.
What does the energy released by cellular respiration support?
Other chemical reactions and processes necessary for life.
What is chemical cycling in an ecosystem?
The reuse of matter as chemicals move between organisms and the non-living environment.
How can chemicals pass from one organism to another in an ecosystem?
Through feeding.
How do waste and dead material contribute to chemical cycling?
They return substances to the environment, including through decomposition, making them available for uptake again.
What is an organism’s genome?
Its complete set of genetic material.
How do genes contribute to an organism’s characteristics?
Through the information they contain.
How can environmental conditions influence an organism’s characteristics?
They can affect how characteristics develop or are expressed.
How does the relative influence of genetic and environmental factors differ between characteristics?
Their relative influence varies between characteristics.
What is evolution?
Change in the inherited characteristics of populations over generations.
What process can contribute to evolution?
Natural selection.
How can diverging populations descended from shared ancestors contribute to biodiversity?
They can give rise to different species.
What connects living organisms through their evolutionary history?
Common ancestry.
How does the recency of a common ancestor relate to how closely organisms are related?
Organisms with a more recent common ancestor are more closely related.