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Previous Year Questions

TLS Online TPP Program

QUESTION ID:1

A student is required to demonstrate a high level of comprehension of the subject, especially in the social sciences.
The word closest in meaning to comprehension is

QUESTION ID:2

Choose the most appropriate word from the options given below to complete the following sentence.
One of his biggest ______ was his ability to forgive.

QUESTION ID:3

Rajan was not happy that Sajan decided to do the project on his own. On observing his unhappiness, Sajan explained to Rajan that he preferred to work independently.
Which one of the statements below is logically valid and can be inferred from the above sentences?

QUESTION ID:4

I f y = 5x2 + 3, then the tangent at x = 0, y = 3

QUESTION ID:5

A foundry has a fixed daily cost of Rs 50,000 whenever it operates and a variable cost of Rs 800Q, where Q is the daily production in tonnes. What is the cost of production in Rs per tonne for a daily production of 100 tonnes?

QUESTION ID:6

Find the odd one in the following group : ALRVX, EPVZB, ITZDF, OYEIK

QUESTION ID:7

 Anuj, Bhola, Chandan, Dilip, Eswar and Faisal live on different floors in a six-storeyed building (the ground floor is numbered 1, the floor above it 2, and so on). Anuj lives on an even-numbered floor. Bhola does not live on an odd numbered floor. Chandan does not live on any of the floors below Faisal’s floor. Dilip does not live on floor number 2. Eswar does not live on a floor immediately above or immediately below Bhola. Faisal lives three floors above Dilip. Which of the following floor-person combinations is correct?

QUESTION ID:8

The smallest angle of a triangle is equal to two thirds of the smallest angle of a quadrilateral. The ratio between the angles of the quadrilateral is 3:4:5:6. The largest angle of the triangle is twice its smallest angle. What is the sum, in degrees, of the second largest angle of the triangle and the largest angle of the quadrilateral?

QUESTION ID:9

One percent of the people of country X are taller than 6 ft. Two percent of the people of country Y are taller than 6 ft. There are thrice as many people in country X as in country Y. Taking both countries together, what is the percentage of people taller than 6 ft?

QUESTION ID:10

The monthly rainfall chart based on 50 years of rainfall in Agra is shown in the following figure. Which of the following are true? (k percentile is the value such that k percent of the data fall below that value)
(i) On average, it rains more in July than in December
(ii) Every year, the amount of rainfall in August is more than that in January
(iii) July rainfall can be estimated with better confidence than February rainfall
(iv) In August, there is at least 500 mm of rainfall

QUESTION ID:11

Darwin’s ideas on evolution by natural selection were influenced by

QUESTION ID:12

Which of the following statements about the evolution of humans is believed to be TRUE?

QUESTION ID:13

On average, which ecosystem has the LOWEST net primary productivity per unit area?

QUESTION ID:14

A researcher measures the height of 100 trees of a species. The mean of these observations is 50 and the variance is 16. The standard error of the mean calculated from these observations is ______

QUESTION ID:15

A researcher tested for the presence of parasitic infection in 100 male and 100 female deer. Forty males and 30 females were found to be infected. To test if males are significantly more susceptible to infection than females, which of the following is an appropriate statistical test?

QUESTION ID:16

The frequency of the dominantred allele (R) in a population of diploid organisms is equal to the frequency of the recessive white allele (r). The frequency of red individuals assuming Hardy- Weinberg equilibriumis(express the frequency using decimal notation, not as a fraction or a percentage)

QUESTION ID:17

Two sympatric species fruits file congregate on the fruit of two closely related species of trees  for mating. The cue most likely to be used by these fly species to locate their mates from a long distance would be

QUESTION ID:18

Human activities release about 7 x 1015 g of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. Of this, about 3 x 1015 g accumulates in the atmosphere. Another 2 x 1015 g is absorbed by the oceans. The remaining 2 x 1015 g enters the “missing carbon sink.” This sink is best explained by which of the following?

QUESTION ID:19

The slope of a function is zero

QUESTION ID:20

According to foraging theory, if two food items are commonly available and equally abundant, an optimal forager should choose the item that

QUESTION ID:21

Phenotypic plasticity refers to

QUESTION ID:22

The coefficient of determination, R2, represents how well a linear model fits the data. R2 is the sum of squared deviations of observations from the regression line divided by the total sum of squared deviations from the mean value. For the figure below, R2 is closest to

QUESTION ID:23

Death Feigning  behaviour(i.e., pretending to be dead when attacked) is found in snakes and millipedes. This similarity in behaviour between snakes and millipedes is an example of

QUESTION ID:24

To evaluate the relationship between two variables (e.g., resource abundance and population density), a linear regression can be used. Here, the statistical null hypothesis which allows us to evaluate whether there is a relationship between these variables is

QUESTION ID:25

Which of the following conditions is NOT necessary for evolution by natural selection?

QUESTION ID:26

C3, C4 and CAM are the main photosynthetic pathways in plants. The relative abundance of C3 plants __________________ with increasing latitude.

QUESTION ID:27

The pyramidal structure of decreasing biomass with increasing trophic level in terrestrial ecosystems is a consequence of:

QUESTION ID:28

Typical green leaves from plants absorb light of the following colour/s:

QUESTION ID:29

Christian Bergmann, a 19th century biologist, observed that related taxa showed increasing body size with increasing latitude. One explanation for this pattern, also called ‘Bergmann’s Rule’, is

QUESTION ID:30

All else being equal, in a species  with two sexes, which of the following is true with regard to mate choice?

QUESTION ID:31

Temperate organisms have wider tolerance ranges for temperature than do tropical organisms. If temperatures increase across the globe by 2°C, which of the following is possible?

QUESTION ID:32

The length of Henle’s loop in the kidneys of rodents is longest in

QUESTION ID:33

A recent experiment with a fast growing variety of tomato studied the inheritance of two traits – dwarfism and flower colour. The experiment successfully demonstrated Mendel’s law of segregation and for both traits the expected 3:1 ratio of dominant to recessive phenotype was observed. However, the experiment failed to demonstrate the law of independent assortment for the two traits. One possible reason for this is

QUESTION ID:34

Grazing by large herbivores can increaseplant diversity by which of the following mechanisms?
(i) Reducing abundance of dominant plants and favouringrare species
(ii) Accelerating rates of nutrient cyclingin the ecosystem
(iii) Promoting photo-respiration by increasing ambient CO2 concentration
(iv) Decreasing stomatal conductance which promotes biomass production

QUESTION ID:35

The doubling time for a bacterial population is 60 minutes. Given a density of 35 cells/ml in a population in its exponential growth phase and assuming unlimited resources, the number of hours that the population will take to grow to 560 cells/ml is _________________

QUESTION ID:36

Birds that are brood parasites lay eggs in the nests of other birds. This is a successful strategy for the parasite only if

QUESTION ID:37

What should be the sound frequency ranges used for acoustic communication between two herds of elephants living far apart in isolated forests, domestic dogs in neighboring streets, and insect feeding bats catching prey above the tree canopy?

QUESTION ID:38

A student grows a bacterial culture in a container starting with a small population size and high resource levels. To estimate population growth, the student puts the container on a weighing machine after air-tight sealing of the container to avoid contamination. Which of the following graphs is the most likely result obtained in the experiment?

QUESTION ID:39

Birds show much variation in sexual size dimorphism (body size differences between males and females), which is hypothesized to be associated with their mating system. Match the two groups below to reflect the expected pattern in mating system and sexual size dimorphism in birds.

QUESTION ID:40

Consider the following frequency distribution of an ecological variable

Such a distribution with two peaks is called a bi-modal distribution. Here, the peak with the higher frequency is called the major mode and the one with the lower frequency is called the minor mode. A student has marked four points on the x-axis, i.e., P, Q, R and S. Match the points with the most appropriate statistic: Mean, Median, Major mode, and Minor mode

QUESTION ID:41

In blackbuck, it has been hypothesized that the reproductive fitness of an individual depends on the group size as given below.

Two groups of unrelated individuals, labelled as G1 and G2,encounter each other. Note that G2isatthe optimal group size. Individuals from each group can decide whether to stay in their group, or join the other group. Individuals cannot prevent others from leaving or joining any group. Under these
circumstances, which of the following is most likely?

QUESTION ID:42

In certain cases, a critical group size of organisms is required before a certain action, such as secretion of an enzyme, is taken by individuals of the group. This can be graphically represented as shown below.

A student conducts experiments and collects data to study this behavior in her favorite system. Instead of plotting P vs. G, the student plots G (on the y-axis) vs. P (on the x-axis). Assuming that her system did indeed exhibit the group behaviour of the type shown above, how will her modified plot look?

QUESTION ID:43

All adults of a fish species have bright colour patterns in population P and all adults have dull colour patterns in population Q. Colour patterns in this species are determined early in development. Which of the following study designs is best suited to test whether this colour pattern difference has a genetic basis?

QUESTION ID:44

The figure below shows how competition among foragers in a resource patch reduces individual foraging rates. According to this figure, the expected foraging rate for a solitary individual is ____________

QUESTION ID:45

Find the matching triplet

QUESTION ID:46

In birds that pair during the breeding season, it is hypothesized that males need to aggressively guard their mates against mating with intruder males. To test this hypothesis, a scientist presents a male dummy bird to a male bird on his territory just before the female lays her eggs. The dummy is left on the territory. The male was aggressive towards the dummy before the eggs were laid and this aggression declined after egg-laying. Which additional experiment will NOT provide further information to test this hypothesis?

QUESTION ID:47

The figure panels below show population growth in two species, when they are grown alone, and also when they are grown together. From the nature of their growth curves, one can infer that the  interaction between these species is an example of



QUESTION ID:48

There are two coins in a bowl. Because of differences in the size of the two coins, the probability of picking the bigger coin is 0.6. The bigger coin is unbiased, whereas the smaller coin has a probability of 0.6 of yielding heads. A blind-folded student picks a coin from the bowl and tosses the coin. The probability (expressed using decimal notation, not as a fraction or percentage) that the coin yields a head is ________

QUESTION ID:49

The accompanying figure shows logistic population growth for two species in the same habitat.

Which of the following conclusions hold true?
(i) Species 1 has higher intrinsic growth rate
(ii) Species 2 has higher intrinsic growth rate
(iii) Carrying capacity for Species 1 is higher
(iv) Carrying capacity for Species 2 is higher

QUESTION ID:50

Which of these is true with respect to Batesian mimicry?

QUESTION ID:51

In the phylogeny below, branch lengths are proportional to the percent sequence divergence. The scale below the phylogeny indicates branch length. Assume that the gene used to reconstruct the phylogeny of the species evolves in a clock-like fashion. It is known that the divergence between Species 4 and Species 5 happened 2 million years ago. The time of divergence (in million years)between Species 3 and Species 1 is ______________

QUESTION ID:52

Humans have a preference for high calorie foods. Assume a study has shown that (i) the life expectancy of human beings has reduced from 85 to 74 years due to increased consumption of high calorie foods, and (ii) the maximum reproductive age is 70 years. Given these assumptions, which of the following is most likely to happen in the next 200 years?

QUESTION ID:53

A recently discovered fossil contains 3.125% of 14Cfound in present day organisms. If the half-life of 14Cis 5730 years, the age of the fossil in years is ____________

QUESTION ID:54

In the hypothetical scenario below, there are four small islands (P, Q, R and S) near a very large continent. The distances of the islands from the continent, as well as the sizes of the islands, vary as indicated in the diagram. Assume that dispersal happens only between the continent and the islands, but not among islands. The theory of island biogeography would predict that the number of species in each island will be best represented by which of the following?


QUESTION ID:55

There are 19500 ants of a species on a small island of area 400 sq m. A student collects 1500 ants in 30 randomly placed pit-fall traps. She marks all of them with blue paint and releases them. Due to unusually low temperatures the following night, the ant population on the island experiences 10% mortality. The next day the student lays out another series of randomly placed pit-fall traps and collects 1183 ants. Assuming that (i) mortality is not affected by being painted, (ii) probability of
falling into a trap is not affected by being painted, and (iii) probability of falling into a trap is not affected by the density of ants on the island, the expected number of ants with blue marks in the sample is ____________

QUESTION ID:56

A student wants to test the effect of latitude and longitude on seed size in a plant species. He has the resources to lay a maximum of 9 plots. Which plot designis most appropriate for this question?

QUESTION ID:57

In an experiment, cows were allowed to graze in closed pastures either with wild deer or without wild deer. This experiment was done in the rainy and dry seasons. The results for weight gain in the cows (mean and 95% confidence interval) are shown in the figure below. Based on these results which of the following statements is true?

QUESTION ID:58

The figure below shows how reproductive fitness varies with tail length in a bird species. Given this pattern, what kind of selection is most likely to act on tail length in this population?

QUESTION ID:59

A study monitored insect abundance and drought stress in trees for a period of 10 years in a tropical dry deciduous forest. This study found a strong, statistically significant, negative relationship between insect abundance and drought stress in trees. Based on these results, what can be inferred about the causal relationship between insect abundance and drought stress in trees?

QUESTION ID:60

Assume that a piece of bamboo is a hollow cylinder of negligible wall thickness. The numerical value (in cm) of the ratio of the volume to surface area of such a bamboo, measuring 6 cm in diameter, is ____________

QUESTION ID:61

Simpson’s index of species diversity is given by

is the proportion of species i in the total sample of individuals and n is the total number of species. For the species and their abundances given below, the numerical value of Simpson’s index is ___________________

QUESTION ID:62

Primary succession refers to the sequence of changes in plant communities at a newly formed habitat. Species establishing first at the newly formed habitat (pioneer species) show characteristics that are different from those in species that establish later in the community. Which of the following represents the predicted characteristics of pioneer species?

QUESTION ID:63

Consider the two phylogenies. Which of the following statements is true?

QUESTION ID:64

Species P and Species Q are respectively self-pollinated and cross-pollinated plants that are closely related. Their flowers are visited by bees. Correctly identify which sets of traits are characteristic of Species P relative to the traits of Species Q

QUESTION ID:65

The Venn Diagram below shows numbers of species in three forest types. Which of the following statements is true?