Protist Quiz
Questions: 16 · 10 minutes
1. A plankton sample contains photosynthetic cells enclosed by two fitted, glass-like halves. Which group is the best identification?
Diatoms
Ciliates
Amoebas
Slime molds
2. Which structure primarily enables a Paramecium to move through water?
A single long flagellum
Flowing pseudopodia
Branching hyphae
Numerous short cilia
3. An unknown pond protist is covered in cilia and sweeps food into an oral groove. Which organism is the best match?
Paramecium
Plasmodium
Diatom
Amoeba
4. A microscope reveals a unicellular organism with a membrane-bound nucleus. Which conclusion is best supported?
It must be a bacterium.
It belongs to the true fungi because it is unicellular.
It must be a photosynthetic organism.
It is eukaryotic and could be a protist.
5. Fertilizer runoff triggers a dense bloom of photosynthetic protists. After many bloom organisms die, bacterial decomposition increases. What is a likely result?
A permanent increase in dissolved oxygen
A decline in dissolved oxygen as decomposers respire
The immediate formation of new coral reefs
The conversion of all protists into fungi
6. Which feature is shared by all organisms commonly described as protists?
They obtain all nutrients by photosynthesis.
Their cells contain a nucleus enclosed by a membrane.
They are composed of many specialized tissues.
Their cell walls are made of chitin.
7. Why is Euglena often described as mixotrophic?
It alternates between a haploid body and a diploid body.
It forms a partnership with fungal cells.
It absorbs minerals through root-like structures.
It can photosynthesize and can also obtain organic nutrients from its environment.
8. Which observation provides strong evidence that chloroplasts originated through endosymbiosis?
Chloroplasts have their own DNA and are surrounded by multiple membranes.
Chloroplasts are found only in multicellular plants.
Chloroplasts form directly from the cell nucleus during every division.
Chloroplasts use cilia to move between cells.
9. A physician suspects malaria after a patient returns from a region where infected mosquitoes transmit the disease. Which protist genus causes malaria?
Giardia
Paramecium
Plasmodium
Volvox
10. A freshwater protist’s contractile vacuole stops working. What is most likely to happen first?
The cell will lose its nucleus.
The cell will begin making a chitin wall.
Excess water will accumulate, causing the cell to swell.
The cell will rapidly lose water to its surroundings.
11. A single-celled pond organism has chloroplasts and produces sugars when exposed to light. Which ecological role does it most directly perform?
Nitrogen-fixing bacterium
Decomposer of woody tissue
Consumer of higher predators
Primary producer
12. An amoeba surrounds a food particle by extending temporary parts of its cell. What are these extensions called?
Cilia
Pseudopodia
Hyphae
Spores
13. A coastal water sample contains abundant unicellular organisms with two flagella, and some species in the group can produce harmful blooms. Which group best fits?
Foraminiferans
Dinoflagellates
Diatoms
Euglenids
14. When food becomes scarce, separate cells of a cellular slime mold may gather and coordinate their movement. What does this behavior demonstrate?
Permanent formation of fungal hyphae
Conversion from a eukaryote into a prokaryote
Temporary multicellular cooperation among individual cells
Photosynthesis inside a silica shell
15. A specimen grows as branching hyphae, absorbs nutrients, and has cell walls containing chitin. How should it be classified?
As a ciliate protist
As a photosynthetic protist
As a true fungus rather than a protist
As a prokaryotic decomposer
16. Photosynthetic protists form much of the phytoplankton in an aquatic ecosystem. If their population falls sharply, what is the most direct food-web effect?
Less energy enters the food web through primary production.
Decomposers stop functioning because they require sunlight.
Consumers receive more energy because the water is clearer.
Aquatic consumers immediately become photosynthetic.