Q 01/05

Rats infected with the protist Toxoplasma gondii lose their instinctive fear of the scent of which predator?

A) Owls

B) Cats

C) Snakes

D) Foxes

Answer · why

B) Cats

Cats are the only hosts in which Toxoplasma can reproduce sexually, so a fearless rat may be the parasite's ticket home. Infected rats stop avoiding t...

Q 02/05

The "brain-eating amoeba" Naegleria fowleri infects swimmers when warm fresh water enters which part of the body?

A) The mouth

B) The ears

C) The eyes

D) The nose

Answer · why

D) The nose

The nose gives the amoeba a route along the smell nerves into the brain, where the infection is almost always fatal. Swallowing the same water causes ...

Q 03/05

Which country lost a million lives in the 1840s when the protist Phytophthora infestans rotted its potato crop?

A) Ireland

B) Belgium

C) Scotland

D) Prussia

Answer · why

A) Ireland

Ireland leaned on a single potato variety, the Lumper, so the blight destroyed the staple food of millions. The culprit looks like a fungus but belong...

Q 04/05

What kind of protist is Physarum polycephalum, the brainless yellow blob that solved a maze and copied Tokyo's railways?

A) A flagellate

B) A red alga

C) A slime mold

D) A radiolarian

Answer · why

C) A slime mold

A slime mold has no brain or nerves, yet it linked oat flakes laid out like Tokyo's towns with a network as efficient as the real railway. It is a sin...

Q 05/05

Which Egyptian monuments are built of limestone full of nummulites, the coin-like shells of giant fossil protists?

A) The Giza pyramids

B) The Luxor obelisks

C) The Colossi of Memnon

D) The Abu Simbel temples

Answer · why

A) The Giza pyramids

The Giza pyramids are built of stone that formed on an ancient seabed. The Greek geographer Strabo took the fossils for lentils left behind by the wor...