Cell Cycle and Reproduction FRQ – Jason Bao

You may write notes, outline, or write a practice answer on the front of this sheet. Your one and final
answer must be printed legibly on the back. This assignment in total is worth 6 points and will be graded
as follows:  
6/6 = 100 
5/6 = 90 
4/6 = 80 
3/6 = 70 
2/6 or 1/6 = 60 
You will have 20 minutes to complete this FRQ and it will be included in the FRQ section of your
overall grade. 
1. Examine the graph below and then answer the following questions. (3 points) 

a. Identify what each roman numeral represents. Support your claim.

Roman numeral I represents the G1 phase as during this phase, the cell grows larger but DNA is not
replicated so that is why the amount of DNA stays constant during this phase.

Roman numeral II represents the S phase as during this phase, the cell duplicates its DNA in the nucleus
in which the 46 chromosomes are replicated, which is seen in roman numeral II as the amount of DNA in
the nucleus doubles from the beginning to end of this phase.

Roman numeral III represents the G2 phase as the cell continues to grow and organelles are duplicated yet
the amount of DNA is left unchanged, which mirrors the constant, linear line of numeral III.

Roman numeral IV represents the Mitotic phase of mitosis and cytokinesis because the cell divides its
copied DNA between two daughter cells through mitosis and cytokinesis, both of which are diploid,
which causes the DNA in each daughter cell to be half of the original amount of the duplicated DNA of
parent cell. As such, the amount of DNA in nucleus decreases as seen in Roman numeral IV.
Additionally, the mitotic phase is the shortest phase of the cell cycle as interphase consists of over 90% of
the cycle, which supports the claim that IV is the mitotic phase as the time given in the image for IV was
the smallest.

Roman numeral V represents the G1 phase again as the resulting daughter cells must each grow larger in
size during this phase but the amount of DNA remains unchanged.

b. Identify what a resulting cell would look like at the end of the image
above. Support your claim.  

At the end of the image above, the resulting cell would have become four diploid daughter cells as this is
the process of mitosis in which one parent cell divides into two daughter cells that undergo the cell cycle
and then divide into a total of four diploid daughter cells. This is not meiosis as meiosis produces haploid
gametes from a diploid parent cell which is not the case in this image as after each cell cycle, the daughter
cells have an equal amount of DNA as the original parent cell. As such, the resulting cells would be
genetically identical to the parent cell as the process of mitosis does not allow for genetic variation since
the daughter cells have the exact same copies of DNA from one parent cell.
 
2. When checkpoints and regulators are not functioning well within the cell, bad things happen. (3
points) 
a. Identify 2 cell regulators, as well as how/what they regulate.

2 cell regulators involved in cell cycle control are cyclins and cyclin-dependent kinases (CDKs). They
bind together to form a CDK/cyclin complex and once phosphorylated, this complex can activate,
inactivate, and modify certain target proteins through phosphorylation that are appropriate to the current
cell cycle phase. For example, at the G2 checkpoint, a type of complex of these two cell regulators called
MPF can trigger the passage of the cell into the mitotic phase if the DNA has been correctly replicated.

b. Explain what happens if a cell fails one of these checkpoints and how the body
responds.  

 If a cell fails one of these checkpoints, the cell cycle is halted to either fix the errors or the cell will
undergo apoptosis if the damage is unrepairable. For example, at the G1 checkpoint, if the DNA is
damaged, p53 triggers the production of CDK inhibitors that block CDK-cyclin complex activity, which
gives the cell time to repair DNA using the DNA repair enzymes that p53 also triggered. An alternative at
this checkpoint is that the cell enters G0 phase of resting to wait for better environment conditions or fix
errors to later rejoin the cell cycle or undergo apoptosis. As such, the body halts the cell cycle to prevent
the replication and cell division of errors in the parent cell such as DNA and activates regulators and
enzymes to fix these errors. If they are unfixable, apoptosis is triggered.