Memly's MCAT Biology and Biochemistry: 350 Key Terms
350 terms, with the biochemistry weighted heaviest.
350枚のカード
収録カードを見る（30枚）
全350枚から30枚を抜粋して表示しています。
| 表 | 裏 |
|---|---|
| Amino acid classification by side chain | Definition: The twenty standard amino acids sorted by what their side chain does in water, into nonpolar, polar uncharged, acidic, and basic groups. Why it matters: Nearly every question about folding, charge, or a mutation's effect is answered by which group the residue belongs to. |
| Peptide bond geometry | Definition: The amide linkage between residues, which has partial double bond character from resonance and is therefore planar. Why it matters: No rotation is possible about the peptide bond itself, so backbone conformation is described entirely by the two angles on either side of it. Often confused with: Free rotation. The bond is rigid and almost always in the trans arrangement. |
| Hemoglobin quaternary structure | Definition: A tetramer of two alpha and two beta subunits, each holding a haem group with a central iron. Why it matters: Having four subunits is what makes cooperative binding possible, since one subunit can report its state to the others. |
| Oxidoreductases | Definition: Enzymes catalyzing electron transfer, usually paired with a nicotinamide or flavin coenzyme. Recognized by: Names containing dehydrogenase, oxidase, reductase, or peroxidase. |
| Michaelis-Menten equation | Definition: The relationship giving initial reaction velocity as a function of substrate concentration, rising hyperbolically to a maximum. Assumes: A steady state in which the enzyme-substrate complex is formed and consumed at equal rates, and initial velocity measured before product accumulates. |
| Aldose and ketose | Definition: Sugars classified by whether the carbonyl sits at the end of the chain as an aldehyde or within it as a ketone. Why it matters: Only the aldehyde form is directly oxidizable, which is why ketoses must isomerize before they register in a reducing sugar test. |
| Fatty acid nomenclature | Definition: A fatty acid is described by chain length and by the number and position of double bonds. Why it matters: Position is counted from the carboxyl carbon in systematic naming and from the methyl end in omega naming, so the same molecule carries two different numbers. |
| Nucleoside and nucleotide | Definition: A nucleoside is a base joined to a sugar. A nucleotide adds one or more phosphates. Why it matters: Polymerases add nucleoside triphosphates and release pyrophosphate, so the triphosphate supplies both the residue and the energy for the bond. |
| Eukaryotic RNA polymerases | Definition: Polymerase I makes most ribosomal RNA, polymerase II makes messenger RNA and several small RNAs, and polymerase III makes transfer RNA and one ribosomal RNA. Why it matters: Only the polymerase II transcripts are capped and polyadenylated, so processing follows from which enzyme made the transcript. |
| High-energy phosphate compounds | Definition: Molecules whose phosphate transfer releases a large amount of free energy, including ATP, creatine phosphate, phosphoenolpyruvate, and 1,3-bisphosphoglycerate. Why it matters: The energy is in the difference between reactant and product stability, from charge repulsion and resonance in the released phosphate, not in the bond itself. |
| Investment and payoff phases of glycolysis | Definition: The first phase consumes ATP to phosphorylate and split the six-carbon sugar, and the second recovers more ATP from the two three-carbon products. Why it matters: Phosphorylation traps the sugar in the cell and destabilizes it for cleavage, so spending ATP early is what makes the later yield possible. |
| Pyruvate dehydrogenase complex | Definition: A multi-enzyme assembly using thiamine pyrophosphate, lipoic acid, coenzyme A, FAD, and NAD+ to convert pyruvate to acetyl CoA. Why it matters: The reaction is irreversible, which is why fatty acids cannot be converted back into glucose in humans. |
| Respiratory chain complexes | Definition: Four membrane complexes, with complexes I, III, and IV pumping protons and complex II feeding electrons in without pumping. Why it matters: Because complex II does not pump, electrons entering there yield less ATP than those entering at complex I. |
| Gluconeogenesis | Definition: Synthesis of glucose from pyruvate, lactate, glycerol, and glucogenic amino acids, mainly in the liver. Why it matters: It is not simply reversed glycolysis, because three glycolytic steps are irreversible and must be bypassed. |
| Lipolysis | Definition: Hydrolysis of stored triacylglycerol into fatty acids and glycerol by hormone-sensitive lipase and associated enzymes. Regulated by: Activated by phosphorylation downstream of glucagon and adrenaline, and suppressed by insulin. |
| Transamination | Definition: Transfer of an amino group from an amino acid to a keto acid, producing a new amino acid and a new keto acid. Why it matters: It is freely reversible and conserves nitrogen, so it redistributes amino groups rather than removing them. |
| Absorptive state | Definition: The hours after a meal, when insulin is high and the body stores incoming fuel as glycogen, triacylglycerol, and protein. Why it matters: Glucose is the dominant fuel for every tissue during this window, so fatty acid oxidation is suppressed rather than merely unnecessary. |
| Metabolic actions of insulin | Definition: Promotes glucose uptake in muscle and adipose tissue, glycogen and fatty acid synthesis, and protein synthesis, while suppressing lipolysis and gluconeogenesis. Why it matters: It is the only hormone that lowers blood glucose, which is why its actions are described as anabolic across every fuel class at once. |
| Liver as the metabolic hub | Definition: The organ receiving portal blood first and holding the enzymes for gluconeogenesis, ketogenesis, urea synthesis, and lipoprotein assembly. Why it matters: It buffers the composition of blood leaving it, so other tissues see a far steadier supply than the gut delivers. |
| Chemical classes of hormones | Definition: Peptide and protein hormones, steroid hormones, and amino acid derivatives. Why it matters: Solubility follows the class, and solubility decides whether the hormone needs a surface receptor and whether it travels bound to a carrier protein. |
| Column chromatography | Definition: Separation of a mixture passed through a packed column, with components emerging at different times according to how strongly they interact with the packing. Why it matters: Every chromatographic method is this one idea with a different basis of interaction, so identifying the basis predicts the elution order. |
| Edman degradation | Definition: Sequential removal and identification of one residue at a time from the amino terminus. Why it matters: It reads only a limited stretch before yields decay, and it fails on a blocked amino terminus, which is why long sequences are obtained another way. |
| Spectrophotometry and the Beer-Lambert relationship | Definition: Absorbance is proportional to concentration, path length, and the molar absorptivity of the substance. Why it matters: It makes concentration measurable without consuming the sample, and it underlies almost every continuous enzyme assay. |
| Southern blot | Definition: Transfer of size-separated DNA to a membrane, detected with a labelled nucleic acid probe. Why it matters: It detects a specific sequence within a complex genome, and the pattern of bands reports restriction site differences between individuals. |
| Penetrance | Definition: The proportion of individuals carrying a genotype who show any of the associated phenotype. Why it matters: Incomplete penetrance lets a trait appear to skip a generation without the allele having been lost, which breaks simple pedigree reasoning. Often confused with: Expressivity, which is about degree rather than presence. |
| Loss-of-function mutation | Definition: A change reducing or abolishing the activity of a gene product. Why it matters: It is usually recessive, because one working copy commonly makes enough product. |
| Resting membrane potential | Definition: The steady negative interior voltage of an unstimulated neuron, set mainly by potassium permeability and maintained by the sodium-potassium pump. Why it matters: The membrane is far more permeable to potassium than to sodium at rest, so resting potential sits near the potassium equilibrium value. |
| Cardiac conduction system | Definition: Impulse arising in the sinoatrial node, delayed at the atrioventricular node, then spreading through the bundle branches and Purkinje fibres. Why it matters: The delay lets the atria empty before the ventricles contract, so timing rather than speed is the point of that step. |
| Nephron segments | Definition: Glomerulus and Bowman capsule, proximal convoluted tubule, loop of Henle, distal convoluted tubule, and collecting duct. Why it matters: Each segment has a distinct permeability and transporter set, so knowing the segment predicts what is being moved. |
| Clonal selection | Definition: Expansion of the few lymphocytes whose receptors happen to fit an antigen, from a repertoire generated before exposure. Why it matters: The repertoire is built by random recombination in advance, so the antigen selects rather than instructs. |
このデッキについて
Knowing a definition is rarely what a passage asks for. It asks what the definition predicts: what happens to apparent Km when the inhibitor binds the enzyme-substrate complex, why a curve shifts right when tissue turns acidic, why a protein stops migrating at one point in a pH gradient, what a band at the wrong size means. Every one of those is a definition plus one more step, and that second step is where the marks are. So every card here gives the definition and then the step that makes it usable, on 313 of the 350. The weighting follows where that reasoning is hardest rather than where content is easiest to list: 44 cards on amino acids and protein structure, 35 on enzymes and kinetics, 95 across bioenergetics and metabolism, 40 on the laboratory methods that generate the data in a passage, 50 on organ system physiology, and the rest across nucleic acids, genetics, carbohydrates and lipids. Cell structure and the step-by-step pathways of respiration and photosynthesis sit in the Cell Biology Essentials deck, so the two fit together rather than repeating each other. Cards are tagged by area and by sub-area, so you can run just enzyme kinetics, just the separation techniques, or just nitrogen metabolism on its own. Import it and the deck joins your spaced-repetition schedule. What you should end up with is the thing a passage actually tests: given a graph, a gel, or a curve, being able to say what it means and what would change it.
よくある質問
- Why is the deck weighted toward biochemistry?
- Because that is where a definition and its consequence come apart most sharply. Amino acid chemistry, kinetics, and metabolic regulation carry 204 of the 350 cards, and they are the areas where a passage can hand you a plot and expect you to read a mechanism off it rather than recall a fact.
- What is on each card?
- A term on the front. On the back, a definition on all 350, and on 313 the line that makes it usable, most often the consequence that a question would actually turn on. Where two ideas are routinely swapped, the card names the other one and says what separates them. Each line is labeled, so the back reads as a short structured answer.
- Does it cover the experimental and laboratory questions?
- Yes, as its own block of 40 cards: chromatography by size, charge and affinity, the gel methods including SDS-PAGE and isoelectric focusing, blots and quantitative PCR, sequencing from Sanger to next-generation, and the structural methods from crystallography to cryo-electron microscopy. Each card says what the method separates by, which is what a passage figure usually depends on.
- How does it fit with the Cell Biology Essentials deck?
- They are built to sit side by side and share no cards. That deck covers organelles, membranes, transport, the cell cycle, and the pathways of respiration and photosynthesis step by step. This one starts where those leave off, going deeper on protein chemistry, enzyme kinetics, metabolic regulation and integration, laboratory methods, and human organ system physiology.
- How is it organized for studying one area at a time?
- Every card carries an area tag and a finer sub-area tag, across amino acids and proteins, enzymes, carbohydrates and lipids, nucleic acids, bioenergetics, carbohydrate metabolism, lipid and nitrogen metabolism, metabolic integration, genetics, laboratory methods, and organ systems. Filter by a tag to drill one area, or by the finer tag for a single block such as separation techniques or glycolysis detail.
- Can I import the whole deck on the free plan?
- Yes. Importing a saved deck runs no new AI generation and spends no AI credits, so the free plan imports every card. You can study, edit and delete them afterwards.
- Will importing it twice create duplicates?
- No. Cards you already have are skipped and only cards added in a revision come through. Including re-imports after deleting it, one official deck can be imported three times per account.
- Can I edit the cards after importing?
- Yes. Once imported they are your cards: edit either side, delete the ones you already know cold, retag them, or move them into another deck.
No official questions are reproduced, and every card is written by Memly. Compiled 2026-08-21.