Question 10: the correct answer is 23. Got it right? Score 1 point.
Your round
Add up the points from the 10 answers.
The human body has many details. Reread the explanations and try again another day.
You got the basics right. The questions on blood and genetics are the ones that catch most people out.
You know the human body well. Only the hardest details slipped past you.
Almost everything right. It's worth reading the curiosities to discover even more.
Just for fun. The bands describe how this round went, not you.
Why, for question 10: How many pairs of chromosomes does a common human cell have?
The answer is 23 pairs, that is, 46 chromosomes. Half come from the mother and half from the father. Anyone who marked 46 counted the chromosomes, not the pairs.
The cell's instruction manual
Chromosomes are long DNA molecules coiled around proteins. If the DNA of a single cell were stretched out, it would measure about 2 metres.
The 23rd pair determines chromosomal sex, usually XX or XY. The other 22 pairs are the same in both cases and carry most of the genes.
Reproductive cells, the eggs and sperm, are the exception: they have only 23 chromosomes, one from each pair. At fertilisation, the two sets join and form the full 46 again.
The number of chromosomes does not indicate how complex a living being is. The potato has 48, and there is a fern with over a thousand.
What this quiz covered
Questions 1, 3 and 5 were about the skeleton: how many bones we have, where the smallest one is and which is the longest. Question 6 covered teeth, which look like bones but are a different structure.
Questions 2, 4 and 7 were about organs and functions: the skin, the heart and vitamin D, which links sunlight to bone health. Question 8 dealt with the senses, including the difference between taste and burning.
Questions 9 and 10 were the most technical, about blood types and chromosomes. Anyone who wants to go further will find more facts like these in the list of curiosities about the human body.
Where this information comes from: anatomy and physiology textbooks; Nobel Foundation (Landsteiner, 1930); health ministries and blood centres (blood types).
