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KCSE Cellular Respiration — practice questions

Explore 86 free Cellular Respiration questions in KCSE Biology. Open each question or exercise to read its content, reference answers and available explanation.

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Cellular Respiration questions and exercises with answers

Showing questions 1–30 of 86.

What happens to the potential energy of a compound when an electron is removed from it?Read the answer and worked solution →The principal electron carriers of cellular respiration are derivatives of nucleotides and come from which group of vitamins?Read the answer and worked solution →Why can a living cell not simply store large amounts of free energy inside itself?Read the answer and worked solution →What is the term for the removal of a phosphate group from a molecule?Read the answer and worked solution →What percentage of the adenosine triphosphate made during glucose catabolism is generated by chemiosmosis?Read the answer and worked solution →Where does chemiosmosis take place in a prokaryotic cell, which has no mitochondria?Read the answer and worked solution →In type 2 diabetes, reduced oxidation efficiency of NADH affects which part of cellular respiration?Read the answer and worked solution →In which part of the cell does glycolysis take place in both prokaryotes and eukaryotes?Read the answer and worked solution →Glycolysis does not use oxygen. What term describes a process of this kind?Read the answer and worked solution →Which group of integral proteins assists the facilitated diffusion of glucose into heterotrophic cells?Read the answer and worked solution →Glycolysis begins with one six-carbon glucose molecule. What does it end with?Read the answer and worked solution →What is the job of the first half of the glycolysis pathway?Read the answer and worked solution →Which enzyme catalyses the very first step of glycolysis by phosphorylating glucose?Read the answer and worked solution →An isomerase converts glucose-6-phosphate into which molecule during the second step of glycolysis?Read the answer and worked solution →Which enzyme adds the second phosphate during glycolysis and acts as a rate-limiting enzyme for the pathway?Read the answer and worked solution →Which enzyme cleaves the six-carbon sugar of glycolysis into two three-carbon isomers?Read the answer and worked solution →How many molecules of adenosine triphosphate has the cell invested by the end of the fifth step of glycolysis?Read the answer and worked solution →Which carrier must be regenerated in its oxidized form for the second half of glycolysis to keep running?Read the answer and worked solution →In an environment without oxygen, which alternative pathway restores the oxidized carrier needed by glycolysis?Read the answer and worked solution →What change takes place during the eighth step of glycolysis?Read the answer and worked solution →Enolase catalyses a dehydration reaction in the ninth step of glycolysis. What is the product?Read the answer and worked solution →What is the net gain to the cell from glycolysis after the initial investment is repaid?Read the answer and worked solution →Mature mammalian red blood cells cannot carry out aerobic respiration. What follows from that fact?Read the answer and worked solution →If pyruvate kinase is not present in sufficient quantity, what happens to glycolysis?Read the answer and worked solution →In a eukaryotic cell, where are the pyruvate molecules made by glycolysis taken once oxygen is available?Read the answer and worked solution →Which carrier compound picks up and activates the acetyl group derived from pyruvate?Read the answer and worked solution →Coenzyme A is made from which vitamin?Read the answer and worked solution →During the oxidation of the hydroxyethyl group to an acetyl group, where do the removed electrons go?Read the answer and worked solution →Acetyl coenzyme A delivers its acetyl group to which four-carbon acceptor at the start of the citric acid cycle?Read the answer and worked solution →Who first identified the steps of the citric acid cycle, and in which tissue?Read the answer and worked solution →

Worked practice questions

What happens to the potential energy of a compound when an electron is removed from it?

  1. Its potential energy decreases
  2. Its potential energy increases
  3. Its potential energy is unchanged
  4. Its potential energy is doubled
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Correct answer: A. Its potential energy decreases

1. Removing an electron from a molecule is oxidation. 2. Oxidation results in a decrease in potential energy in the oxidized compound. 3. The electron is not lost to the cytoplasm, it moves onto a second compound whose potential energy rises instead. 4. So the oxidized partner falls in energy while the reduced partner gains it, which rules out an unchanged value. _Source: OpenStax Biology (1st ed., CC BY 4.0), Ch 7 "Cellular Respiration", section 7.1 Energy in Living Systems_

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The principal electron carriers of cellular respiration are derivatives of nucleotides and come from which group of vitamins?

  1. The vitamin K group
  2. The vitamin A group
  3. The vitamin C group
  4. The vitamin B group
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Correct answer: D. The vitamin B group

1. Electron carriers are small compounds that bind and shuttle high-energy electrons between compounds in pathways. 2. The principal carriers are derived from the B vitamin group and are derivatives of nucleotides. 3. Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide comes from niacin, one of the B vitamins. 4. No carrier in this set is built from vitamin A, C or K. _Source: OpenStax Biology (1st ed., CC BY 4.0), Ch 7 "Cellular Respiration", section 7.1 Energy in Living Systems_

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Why can a living cell not simply store large amounts of free energy inside itself?

  1. The heat produced would destroy the cell
  2. The energy would turn the cytoplasm acidic
  3. The energy would stop all enzymes forming
  4. The energy would leak out through the membrane
Show answer and solution

Correct answer: A. The heat produced would destroy the cell

1. A living cell cannot store significant amounts of free energy. 2. Excess free energy would raise the heat inside the cell. 3. That heat drives excessive thermal motion, which damages and then destroys the cell. 4. The cell therefore holds energy in adenosine triphosphate and releases it only as needed. _Source: OpenStax Biology (1st ed., CC BY 4.0), Ch 7 "Cellular Respiration", section 7.1 Energy in Living Systems_

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