AP Biology Review Notes

A series of flashcards covering essential vocabulary and concepts from AP Biology, aimed at helping students prepare for their exams.

Cohesion

The property of water that allows it to stick to itself due to hydrogen bonding.

Adhesion

The ability of water to stick to other substances due to hydrogen bonding.

Selectivity Permeability

A characteristic of biological membranes that allows some substances to pass through while others cannot.

Hydrogen Bonding

The weak attraction between a hydrogen atom covalently bonded to an electronegative atom and another electronegative atom.

Endosymbiotic Theory

A widely accepted explanation for the origin of mitochondria and chloroplasts, suggesting they evolved from free-living prokaryotes that were engulfed by ancestral eukaryotic cells.

Enzyme Denaturation

The process through which an enzyme loses its three-dimensional structure, leading to a loss of function.

Osmosis

The diffusion of water across a selectively permeable membrane from an area of low solute concentration to an area of high solute concentration.

Genetic Drift

A mechanism of evolution that involves random changes in allele frequencies in a population.

Phenotypic Variation

Differences in physical appearance among individuals in a population, which are influenced by genetic and environmental factors.

Mitosis

The process of cell division that results in two genetically identical daughter cells from a single parent cell.

Natural Selection

The process by which individuals with favorable traits are more likely to survive and reproduce, thereby increasing the frequency of those traits in the population.

Apoptosis

The process of programmed cell death that occurs in multicellular organisms.

Macromolecules

Large complex molecules which are essential to the structure and function of living cells, including carbohydrates, proteins, lipids, and nucleic acids.

Population Growth Rate

The rate at which the number of individuals in a population increases or decreases over time.

Biogeochemical Cycle

The cycle in which nutrients and minerals move through the environment and living organisms, such as the carbon and nitrogen cycles.

Carrying Capacity

The maximum number of individuals an environment can sustainably support.