NEET Biology The Living World Important Questions Set 01

These Class 11 NEET Biology important questions on The Living World give 40 questions with step-by-step answers, arranged as very short, short and long answer types, as asked in school and board examinations. They help NEET aspirants revise the definitions, structures, differences and key terms of the chapter.

Very Short Answer Type Questions

Question 1. What is classification?
Answer: Classification is the process by which anything is grouped into convenient categories based on some easily observable characters.

Question 2. Expand ICBN and ICZN.
Answer: ICBN : International Code for Botanical Nomenclature ICZN : International Code of Zoological Nomenclature

Question 3. What does 'Linn.' represent in Mangifera indica Linn.?
Answer: 'Linn' indicates that this species was first described by Linnaeus, as the author's name is added after specific name in abbreviated form.

Question 4. Write the category present in the taxonomic hierarchy when arranged in the ascending order.
(a) After genus
(b) Before order
Answer: (a) Species
(b) Class

Question 5. Write the scientific name of the following :
(a) Leopard
(b) Brinjal
Answer: (a) Panthera pardus
(b) Solanum melongena

Question 6. Write the family of the following :
(a) Mangifera indica
(b) Triticum aestivum
Answer: (a) Anacardiaceae
(b) Poaceae

Question 7. Name the preservative solution, used to preserve biological specimens in museums.
Answer: Formalin

Question 8. What is metabolism?
Answer: The sum total of all the chemical reactions occurring in cell is called metabolism.

Question 9. Name an organism where true regeneration occurs.
Answer: Planaria

Question 10. Name the order which includes families like Felidae and Canidae.
Answer: Carnivora

Short Answer Type Questions

Question 11. What is binomial nomenclature? What are its various components? Who proposed the concept of binomial nomenclature?
Answer: The system of providing a name with two components to an organism is called binomial nomenclature. The two components of a scientific name are – generic name and specific epithet. The concept of binomial nomenclature was proposed by Carolus Linnaeus.

Question 12. What forms the basis of modern taxonomic studies?
Answer: External and internal structure, along with the structure of cell, development process and ecological information of organisms are essential and form the basis of modern taxonomic studies.

Question 13. Write a short note on museums.
Answer: Museums have collections of preserved plant and animal specimens for study and reference. Specimens are preserved in the container or jars in preservative solutions. Plants and animals specimens may also be preserved as dry specimens. Insects are preserved in insect boxes after collecting, killing and pinning. Large animals like birds and mammals are usually stuffed and preserved. Museum often have collections of skeletons of animal too.

Question 14. Describe the fourth category of the taxonomic hierarchy.
Answer: Order is the fourth category of the taxonomic hierarchy. It is a group of related families that means related families are kept in the same order. It is the assemblage of families which exhibit few similar characters. The similar characters are less in number as compared to different genera included in a family. Example - Plant families like Convolvulaceae, Solanaceae are included in the order Polymoniales mainly based on the floral characters.

Question 15. What are flora, monographs and catalogues? Why are they important?
Answer: Flora, monographs and catalogues are some other means of recording descriptions. They also help in correct identifications. Flora contains the actual account of habitat and distribution of plant of a given area. These provide the index to the plant species found in a particular area. Monographs contain informations on any one taxon.

Question 16. What are botanical gardens? Give examples.
Answer: Botanical gardens are specialised gardens which have collections of living plants for reference. Plant species in these gardens are grown for identification purposes and each plant is labelled indicating its botanical or scientific name and its family. Example - Indian Botanical Garden, Howrah; National Botanical Research Institute, Lucknow

Question 17. What do you understand by taxonomic aids?
Answer: The certain procedures and techniques to store and preserve the informations as well as the specimens are called taxonomic aids.

Question 18. Why growth is not the defining property of living organisms?
Answer: Increase in mass and increase in number of individuals are the two characteristics of growth. Non-living objects also grow if we take increase in body mass as a criterion for growth. However, this kind of growth is exhibited by non-living objects by accumulation of material on the surface. In living organisms, growth is from inside. Therefore, growth is not taken as the defining property of living organism.

Question 19. Why metabolism is a defining feature of all living organisms?
Answer: The sum total of all the chemical reactions occurring in our body is metabolism. No non-living object exhibits metabolism. Metabolic reactions can be demonstrated outside the body in cell-free system. An isolated metabolic reactions outside the body of an organisms, performed in a test tube is neither living nor non-living. Isolated metabolic reactions in vitro are not living things but surely living reactions. Hence, metabolism is a defining feature of all living organism without exception.

Question 20. Canis lupus is scientific name of wolf. Write any two rules which are followed while writing this scientific name.
Answer: (a) The first word in this name represents the genus, i.e., Canis while the second component denotes the specific epithet, i.e., lupus.
(b) The first letter of genus is capital and of species is small. For example, Canis starts with capital letter whereas lupus starts with small letter.
(c) These two names are underlined separately when hand-written.

Question 21. Fishes, amphibians, reptiles are included in the phylum Chordata. Why?
Answer: They are included in the phylum Chordata because of the presence of notochord and dorsal hollow neural system.

Question 22. Write the generic and specific name of tiger.
Answer: Generic name – Panthera Specific name – tigris

Question 23. How can you define self-consciousness of an organism and why it cannot be the defining feature of living state of a human being?
Answer: Self-consciousness is the ability of an organism to sense its surroundings or environment and respond according to the environmental stimuli. Living phenomenon in human beings is highly complex and is not attributable to the feature of consciousness alone as in certain medical conditions, patients are observed to lose consciousness yet functional metabolically due to the underlying interactions among the constituent cells.

Question 24. Can reproduction be used as an all-inclusive defining characteristic of living organisms? Give two examples to support your answer.
Answer: No, reproduction cannot be used as an all-inclusive defining characteristic of living organisms. Examples :
(a) Mules, worker bees, infertile human couples are all living organisms on the basis of other defining characters but they lack the capacity to reproduce. They are sterile and are not able to produce young ones.
(b) The unicellular algae, bacteria, amoeba etc. divide to increase the number of cells. The increase in number of cell is equivalent to growth. Therefore, it is not clear if division of cell should be considered as growth or reproduction.

Question 25. What do you mean by systematics? Write the origin of the word systematics.
Answer: Systematics is the science that deals with diversity of organisms and all their comparative and evolutionary relationships by comparing group of organisms at every level of classification right from species to the kingdom. The word systematics is derived from the Latin word 'Systema' which means systematic arrangement of organisms.

Question 26. Which taxonomical aid serves as quick referral system for identification of plants? Expand NBRI.
Answer: Herbarium serves as quick referral system for taxonomic research. National Botanical Research Institute.

Question 27. Write the genus and family to which species pardus, tigris, leo, belong
Answer: Genus – Panthera Family – Felidae

Question 28. Answer the following questions
(a) Name the family in which Solanum, Petunia and Datura are placed.
(b) What is the title of the publication based on systematics published by Linnaeus?
Answer: (a) Family – Solanaceae
(b) Systema Naturae

Question 29. Define herbarium.
Answer: Herbarium is a store house of collected plant specimens that are dried, pressed and preserved on sheets. These specimens, along with their descriptions on herbarium sheets become a store house or repository for future use.

Question 30. What do you understand by the terms?
(a) Couplet
(b) Lead
Answer: (a) The contrasting characters generally occurring in pair is called couplet. The key, a taxonomical aid used for identifying plants and animals is based on a couplet.
(b) Each statement in the key is called a lead.

Long Answer Type Questions

Question 31. How can you define a living organism? Why growth is not considered as a defining feature of life?
Answer: Living organisms are self-replicating, evolving and self-regulating interactive systems capable of responding to various external stimuli. Growth is not considered as a defining feature of life because it is defined as an increase in body mass which is observed in both living (such as animals) and non-living systems (such as mountains). Thus, growth fails to be the only criterion for defining life.

Question 32. Give the four most unique features of living state and comment on the failure of any two as the life defining feature of living organisms.
Answer: The four most unique features of living state include :
(a) Growth, (b) Reproduction, (c) Metabolism and (d) Self-consciousness
(a) Growth : It cannot be used as an all-inclusive defining property of living system because certain non-living systems such as mountains etc. also show increase in size and number of constituents.
(b) Reproduction : Reproduction also fails to be the defining feature as many organisms such as mules do not reproduce even once during their lifetime.
(c) Metabolism : The metabolic reactions occurring inside living organisms can also be demonstrated outside the body in cell-free systems. Therefore, metabolism cannot be considered as the only life defining feature.
(d) Self-consciousness : Not all living systems are in a condition to sense and respond to their environmental stimuli, as is the case in certain medical conditions. Therefore, self-consciousness alone cannot be used as the life defining feature.

Question 33. Explain the following :
(a) Nomenclature (b) Need of nomenclature
(c) Pre-requisite for nomenclature (d) ICBN
(e) ICZN
Answer: (a) Nomenclature : The process of giving a standardised name to living organisms is called nomenclature.
(b) Need of nomenclature : Nomenclature is necessary to eliminate any confusion in the names of organisms across the world.
(c) Pre-requisite for nomenclature : Identification is the pre-requisite to nomenclature as correct naming is possible only after correctly describing the organism.
(d) ICBN : It stands for International Code for Botanical Nomenclature, which provides principles and criteria for writing scientific names of plants.
(e) ICZN : It stands for International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, which provides principles and criteria for writing scientific names of animals.

Question 34. What are the universal rules of nomenclature?
Answer: Universal rules of nomenclature are as follows :
(i) Biological names are generally in Latin and they are Latinised it from other language.
(ii) The first word in a biological name represents the genus while the second component denotes the specific epithet.
(iii) Both the words in a biological name, when handwritten are separately underlined, or printed in italics to indicate their Latin origin.
(iv) The first word denoting the genus starts with a capital letter while the specific epithet starts with a small letter.

Question 35. (a) What is the genus, family, order, class, phylum, kingdom and scientific name of man?
(b) Give the alternate term of phylum used for classifying plants.
Answer: (a) Genus – Homo Order – Primata Family – Hominidae Class – Mammalia Phylum – Chordata Kingdom – Animalia Scientific name – Homo sapiens
(b) Division

Question 36. Give hierarchical arrangement of taxonomic categories in ascending order. Write any three species of genus Panthera.

Answer:

Kingdom

Phylum/Division

Class

Order

Family

Genus

Species Species of genus Panthera are
(i) leo
(ii) uncia
(iii) tigris

Question 37. (a) Name the scientific naming system having two components.
(b) Who proposed this system?
(c) Name the two components of this system.
(d) Write the scientific names of mango, potato and lion, along with the families they belong to.
Answer: (a) Binomial nomenclature
(b) Carolus Linnaeus
(c) Two components :
(i) Generic name
(ii) Specific epithet
(d) Mango – Mangifera indica Family – Anacardiaceae Potato – Solanum tuberosum Family – Solanaceae Lion – Panthera leo Family – Felidae

Question 38. (a) Write two rules of nomenclature that are followed when scientific names are handwritten.
(b) Write the scientific names of man, housefly and leopard and identify the genus of each.
Answer: (a) Rules :
(i) When handwritten, both the words of a biological name are separately underlined.
(ii) The first word denoting the genus starts with a capital letter while the specific epithet starts with a small letter.
(b) Scientific names : Man → Homo sapiens Genus → Homo Housefly → Musca domestica Genus → Musca Leopard → Panthera pardus Genus → Panthera

Question 39. What is/are
(a) Taxonomy?
(b) Uses of taxonomic studies (any two)?
(c) Prime source of taxonomic studies?
(d) Pre-requisite for taxonomic studies?
Answer: (a) The classification of all living organisms into different taxa on the basis of varying characteristics is called taxonomy.
(b) Taxonomic studies are useful in various fields such as agriculture, forestry and industry. Taxonomic studies also help in knowing bioresources and their diversity.
(c) The collection of actual specimens of plant and animal species is the prime source of taxonomic studies.
(d) Taxonomic studies require correct classification and identification of organisms.

Question 40. (a) Define the following terms :
(i) Taxon
(ii) Taxonomic hierarchy
(iii) Taxonomic category
(b) Arrange the following in ascending order of taxonomic hierarchy. Solanum, Polymoniales, Solanaceae, melongena, Angiospermae, Plantae

Answer:

(a) (i) Taxon : Each category included in taxonomic hierarchy referred to as a unit of classification which represents a rank is commonly called taxon.
(ii) All categories or taxa together constitute the taxonomic hierarchy.
(iii) Taxonomic category : The categories which are used for the classification of living organisms in taxonomy.
(b) Plantae

Angiospermae

Polymoniales

Solanaceae

Solanum

melongena