Sample Lecture Problems
Professor J.D. Ackerman
Environmental Studies
UNBC
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What is evolution? How does it occur?
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Where does the concept of eidos fit in contemporary thought?
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Mr. Mongomery Burns, the owner of a nuclear power plant in Springfield
has been accused of polluting a local river. Reports of three-eyed
fish have surfaced since the plant was built. Mr. Burns issued a
statement indicating that three-eyed fish are a natural occurance and have
no relation to his plant. In response, you sample fish upstream and
downstream of the power plant looking for three-eyed fish. You know
that the natural rate of occurance is as follows:
Two-eyed = 0.98
Three-eyed = 0.02
The results of your study are:
2-eyed 3-eyed
upstream
199 1
downstream 152
48
Using the following equation, what conclusions can you draw? Note: df=1
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What values should you report from a linear regression? What do they
mean?
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Define a Hookean material.
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A spherical microbe requires diffusion to transport gases. To do
this, it must maximize its surface area relative to its volume. As
body size increases, do you predict the surface area to increase or decrease
relative to its volume? Use the following equations to test your
prediction.
SA = 4(PI)r^2
V = (4(PI)4^3)/3
Calculate V and SA for r = 1, 25, 100
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Calculate the Poisson's ratio for a rectangle that has been
stretched.
The original dimensions are 3 cm x 5 cm
The stretched dimensions are 1 cm x 7 cm
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A 2m long detached branch of 25 mm diameter suspended between two trees
carries 5000N of load. If the Young's modulus is 3.0 GPa, calculate
the deflection of the bar. What would you expect if the branch was
attached to a tree?
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Mike did a regression between body length and mass for a group of mussels
he collected. Unfortunately, he dropped his graph and mixed it up
with his other graphs. Which one of these regressions shows the relationship
for shell length on shell surface area? What did you base your choice
on?
A) y = 2.0144x - 1.2137
B) y = 1.0615x + 0.4
R^2 = 0.9797
R^2 = 0.934
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What are the parameters we use to contrast among gases, liquids and solids?
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What is the continuity principle?
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What is Bernoulli's Principle and how can it be used to understand animal
locomotion?
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What is a boundary layer? How do we describe it? Why is it important
for the feeding and reproduction of organisms?
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What is the Reynolds number? Why is it essential for describing flow
conditions?
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What would the fluid dynamic conditions be for a sockeye salmon (1 m long)
swimming at 10 m/s in the Fraser River?
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What are the fluid conditions around a swimming fish with an Re of 3500?
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How can we use information about the skeletal systems of organisms
to predict their locomotion?
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What is the role of undulations in defining the locomotion of fish?
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What is the putative role of helically wound fibres in skeletal systems
of swimmers?
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What are the two forms of Drag? How can they be predicted and measured
mathematically and experimentally?
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How would you determine the efficiency of a propulsive mechanism?
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Why is filter feeding a misnomer?
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What role does creeping flow have in the capture of particles by suspension
feeders?
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If NS = 20, NR
=0.1, NI = 0.001, and NG = 5, what arethe most likely forms of particle
capture?
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How can setae be both paddles and rakes? Explain?
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What is the role of mucous in suspension feeding?
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What are the differences between Clearance Rate and Grazing
Rate models for suspension feeding?
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How does suspension feeding differ among arthropods, lophophorates
and bivalves?
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How does particle capture occur in bivalves? What two features
enhance this mechanism?
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What is the difference between advection and diffusion? Explain
using mathematical models.
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Water flowing at 10 m/s in a 2 m deep river passes over a
1 m high rock. What would you expect the surface conditions to be
like? If the river was flowing at 1 cm/s?
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If 119/380 genera of aquatic plants are wind pollinated,
did wind pollination evolve in aquatic plants?
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What are the fluid dynamic advantages for elongate pollen
in seagrasses?
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What three features have been predicted to enhance the fertilization
success of broadcast spawners? Why?
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What fluid dynamic factors has been manipulated by plants
in the dispersal of diaspores? Explain this via examples.
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Two plants with similar sized autogyroscopic fruit have been
recently identified. Given the mass of 15 g for Species A and 10
g for Species B, which will disperse farther? Why? What if their
wing loadings were the same?
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How has the transport hypothesis been used to explain larval
recruitment?
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Why is larval settlement a misnomer?
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Last modified on December 7, 1998.