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Practical skills assessed in a written examination

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Question 55

A student plans to compare the rate of anaerobic respiration in two different strains of yeast, Strain X and Strain Y.

a.

The student uses glucose as the respiratory substrate. The student wants to prepare a 0.02 mol dm−30.02\text{ mol dm}^{-3}0.02 mol dm−3 glucose solution for each yeast culture.

The student uses the following method to prepare each 0.02 mol dm−30.02\text{ mol dm}^{-3}0.02 mol dm−3 glucose solution:

  • Perform two sequential dilutions from a 2.0 mol dm−32.0\text{ mol dm}^{-3}2.0 mol dm−3 glucose stock solution.
  • For each dilution, use a measuring cylinder to measure the volume of distilled water and a plastic transfer pipette to transfer the glucose solutions.

Suggest two ways in which the student can reduce the percentage error in their measurements when preparing these glucose solutions.

[2]
b.

Complete the sentences below to outline a robust experimental procedure:

  • To avoid contamination by unwanted microbes, the yeast should be added to glucose solutions made with sterile or ............................... water.
  • To maintain anaerobic conditions throughout the experiment, the respiration vessel must be completely ............................... .
  • After repeating the measurement with 15 populations of each strain, the student calculates the mean rate of respiration and the ............................... for each strain to determine the precision and spread of the data.
[3]

Practical skills assessed in a written examination Questions

  1. A Level
  2. /Biology
  3. /Practical skills assessed in a written examination