Practice question · Match the pairs
Match each piece of evidence for endosymbiosis to what it indicates.
- Double membrane
- Circular DNA
- 70S ribosomes
- Sensitivity to antibacterial antibiotics
- Consistent with engulfment by a host cell
- Machinery still resembling a bacterium’s
- The bacterial ribosome type, not the eukaryotic one
- The chromosome form used by bacteria
Hints
- Each line points independently at a bacterial origin.
- The strength of the case comes from their convergence, not from any one alone.
Show the answer
- Double membrane → Consistent with engulfment by a host cell
- Circular DNA → The chromosome form used by bacteria
- 70S ribosomes → The bacterial ribosome type, not the eukaryotic one
- Sensitivity to antibacterial antibiotics → Machinery still resembling a bacterium’s
Why
Each observation on its own admits alternative explanations; together they converge on one conclusion. That convergence is what turned endosymbiosis from a speculation into the standard account.
Practise The First Cells and Endosymbiosis
The app has 4 more questions on this lesson, and keeps your place in the course. Biology I is free to start.
More questions on The First Cells and Endosymbiosis
- An endosymbiont surrenders most of its genome, which is why it can no longer live alone. A free-living…
- Mitochondria contain their own DNA and divide independently of the cell that hosts them.
- Which statements about viruses are correct?
- Complete the account of how genes move between prokaryotes.
- Early phylogenies assumed inheritance was strictly vertical, yet horizontal gene transfer is pervasive among…
- Arrange these events in the order they occurred in the history of life.