So, what is tabulating the information? It is simply simplifying the difficult and rigourous concepts and theories that you have already studied for GAMSAT humanities and science. This can be in the form of charts, flowcharts, tables and even flashcards. These are small stuff that helps you recall and revise all subjects that you crammed during your extensive GAMSAT preparation days. The best thing about tabulation is that a 4000 page book can be shortened to a 40 page note that will help you remember almost everything. But beware, the 40 page note will only help you if you have already read through and understood the 4000 page book.

Let me give you an example of how tabulation looks like. For example, you need to learn the fate of erythrocytes after its 120 days of life in the circulatory system. If you pick up a biochemistry book to read this part it might take up around 2 to 4 hours of your time, depending upon your reading and comprehending skills to understand the concept etc. You can shorten this time to only 10 to 15 mins and still understand as much. Here is how you do it.

Since you don’t have much time to go through the book, google (or use any search-engine) for your requirement. These are the 2 results I would like to share with you which will give you an idea of an easy and an advanced flowchart for the fate of the red blood cells.

Here’s the easy one -

(a) Erythrocytes die after about 120 day and are the removed in the liver

(b) The Kupffer cells( phagocytic cells) found within the lumen of the sinusoid engulf the erythrocytes and release the haemoglobin to the hepatocytes.

(c) Haemoglobin is broken down in the Kupffer cell to form haem and globin groups.

(d) The protein globin group is hydrolysed by peptidases in the kupffer cell to amino acids which are either used in protein synthesis or they are metabolised.

(e) The haem group is broken down to remove the inorganic group, Iron which is then stored in the liver.

Bilirubin the other by-product of haem breakdown has no functional role and is modified by the hepatocytes before being secreted as part of Bile.

(f) Bilirubin is stored in the gall bladder. After secretion into the duodenum it is modified by bacteria to form Sterobilin that colours faeces.

(g)Iron is sent to the major bones for the process of haemopoiesis (blood cell formation).

The above figure and notes will help you remember the basic fate of the breakdown of the RBC into haem and globin part. You need to, although, study a little more than this.

Here’s the advanced one -

This figure shows you both the intravascular and extravascular haemolysis. It also gives you the detailed procedure of breakdown of haemoglobin and yet in less than half a page.

In the similar way you can find compressed information in the table form and you can search for every topic that you have studied. You will find everything that you need. All you need now is to have belief in yourself.

Enjoy the wonders of study in the last few days. Cheers!

References:
http://click4biology.info/c4b/H/H4.htm
http://atlas.arabslab.com/

Generally, Human body gets infected with microbial invasions through various routes; via – air, water and food. Once inside our body, the microbial cells multiply or replicate at an amazing rate. For example, typical bacteria can double in number in minutes. Their growth cycle or growth phase is so interesting to study that ACER has often included the Bacterial Growth Curve in multiple occasions of GAMSAT. Let us try to understand the uniqueness of Bacterial Growth Curves along with a GAMSAT standard question.

Qs: From a study done on the effect of pH on pathogen growth and commensal growth in drinking water, we get the following graph-

Human Stomach has a higher concentration of commensal microorganisms than pathogens. What could be the most probable pH of gastric (stomach) juices?

The Multiple alternatives are:

(A) 3.0-5.0

(B) 6.0-8.0

(C) 4.0-6.0

(D) 7.0-9.0

Now, to answer the question, we have to refer to the graph. In the graph, the growth of commensals is maximum at the pH range of 3-5. Again, the optimum pH for the growth of pathogens is in between 6-8. But, in the pH ranges of 4-6 and 7-9, the percentage of growth rate for any of the two classes of microorganisms is not high enough. Therefore, option C and D gets discarded from the consideration. Since the stomach environment strongly favours the commensals against the pathogens, hence, gastric juices will have a similar pH to that of the optimum growth pH for commensals. This makes option A the correct alternative for the question.

We have seen how a bacterial growth curve could act as an excellent background passage for GAMSAT Section III questions. Similarly, more questions could be formulated on Bacterial Growth curves, as Bacterial growth is influenced by multiple parameters like temperatures, substrate concentration and others. GAMSAT aspirants should look into this topic and practice requisite exercise questions to develop fluid understanding and problem solving skills for Microbial Growth. Remember, this practice could enhance your GAMSAT preparation for the coming GAMSAT 2010.

Before going too far to find relevant books and reading material, just start with the daily newspaper. Whichever you are habitual to read every morning, and if you are not start picking up the Sydney Morning Herald or the Australian both are good newspapers you can find loads of information which you may need to surf for hours together you can also see the New York times which has loads of information on it. Reading articles on these newspapers will help you in making sense out of the cartoons and illustrations that might be a part of GAMSAT section I.  So look beyond just the text books and reading material. Look around you for information and not just the GAMSAT text books to improve your knowledge. If there is something you are not able to understand like a word or a phrase don’t leave it there because its not a part of a text book. Look for it in the dictionary or thesaurus.

Very specifically GAMSAT books, which can help you, prepare for the test; you can refer to the books below. For writing skills and reasoning these books can prove to be very helpful.

1. Ayn Rand books

2. Gary Provost’s 100 Ways To Improve Your Writing

3. Richard Popkin’s, Philosophy Made Simple

4. Brendan Wilson’s, Simply Philosophy

5. A C Grayling’s The meaning of Things.

A book with comic sketches written by Gary Larson will help you understanding cartoons, sense of humor it’s a good practice book for comic related and illustration related questions. Also read books that have content related to the history of Australia and politics of the world. Practice different types of topics and themes when you are preparing your essay. Do your preparation with a critical point of view. GAMSAT books will defiantly give you a lot of input but a larger portion of information will come for sources and information floating around you which one usually tends to ignore. So ya to be doctors!! Get! Set! And go!!!

To begin with let us briefly discuss about the relationship between biology and chemistry and the evolution of biochemistry. Biology is the study of life or living beings. Chemistry is the study of processes or all chemical reactions in our day to day life. When these chemical reactions are specifically studied in biological systems or between biological molecules, it forms a totally new field of scientific study referred to as ‘Biochemistry’.

Biochemistry is at the core of many areas of biology and is responsible for a large number of scientific breakthroughs in medicine and pharmacy. This is why aspirants with expertise in biochemistry perform increasingly well in GAMSAT exams. Through this subject you get to study an entire range of organisms from bacteria to humans. You also learn about the molecular basis of the structure and processes of life. It plays a vital role in the field of pathology, as the knowledge of biochemistry is very essential in analysing blood and urine samples taken from patients suffering from a wide range of diseases. Biochemistry along with immunology forms an exciting combination in science that provides the medical students with new ways to fight against a range of diseases from arthritis to HIV and cancer.

While preparing for GAMSAT Section III make sure you start with acquiring the fundamental knowledge of structures and functions of different types of carbohydrates, proteins and lipids. Going through an assortment of GAMSAT preparation courses and GAMSAT sample papers will help to build up your ability to clarify the link between biochemistry & the molecular basis of health and disease and help you to answer GAMSAT questions with ease.

Now that you have got a better idea of where to start, hope that your journey with biochemistry along the route of GAMSAT preparations seems satisfying and fruitful. Always remember… mugging up a subject in order to overcome its fear is not a solution. Instead, try and understand it or make friends with it and experience a pleasing voyage.

After going through a couple of GAMSAT test papers, I found these topics from Biology to be most-frequently involved with the questions that usually come in GAMSAT Section III:

1. Cell Biology and Cell Division – Basic structure of the cell, Cell membrane and Membrane transport, Mitosis and Meiosis, Techniques for organic molecule analysis (Chromatography and ELISA).

2. Enzymes – Mechanism of action, enzyme kinetics and enzyme inhibition.

3. Macromolecules and Cellular Metabolism – Structure and Metabolism of carbohydrates, proteins and lipids.

4. Musculoskeletal system – Integument, skeleton, locomotion and movement.

5. Gastrointestinal system – Digestion and absorption.

6. Circulatory system – Body Fluids and circulation.

7. Respiratory system – Breathing, gaseous exchange.

8. Excretory system – Structure of nephron, excretory products and mechanism or removal.

9. Neuromuscular physiology and nervous system – Neural control, coordination and sensory reception

10. Homeostasis, Water, Electrolytes and Acid-Base balance

11. Reproductive system – Structure and function of male and female reproductive organs.

12. Embryology – Foetus development and pregnancy, Foetal circulation.

13. Immunology – Immune system components and mode of function, hygiene.

14. Microbes and communicable diseases – Microbial growth, antimicrobial agents.

15. Genetics – Mendelian inheritance, monohybrid and dihybrid cross, Chromosome structure and components, chromosomal inheritance.

16. Endocrinology and hormonal pathways.

Many of my friends may ask as to why an important topic like ‘organic chemistry’ has not been included in the above formulated Biology syllabus for GAMSAT. Well, Organic chemistry deals with the chemical features of organic molecules, i.e. its approach is mostly dependent on chemical sciences rather than biological perspectives. Hence, a topic like organic chemistry belongs to the domain of Chemistry rather than Biology.

Disclaimer: GAMSAT candidates should never have the perception that everything from GAMSAT Biology questions will come from only the above mentioned topics, as ACER may include other topics as and when they like in GAMSAT test papers in the future. However, these are the most popular and frequently questioned upon topics for GAMSAT Biology till date. Hence, a good background and a clear understanding of these topics will prepare the candidate well enough to withstand the most difficult Biology questions.

Interestingly GAMSAT does not ask you the reason for arriving to an answer, you just need to circle the correct answer, however you arrive at it. This means if you can guess well, you can score upto 25% easily. Therefore, if you are not really sure about an answer, you can use guesswork. So a good lesson to learn here is do not leave any questions unanswered. While you are writing GAMSAT leave a few minutes at the end for yourself to go back to the questions you had left and guess them.

Often you will be able to narrow down your options even further. In the science section, is one of the answers the wrong order of magnitude? In the humanities section, is one of the answers nonsensical given the stimulus paragraph? I like to mark an option I have decided is not correct by crossing out the letter. This means that when I’m reviewing my answer, I can more quickly see why I made the choice I did.

Sometimes you feel that in high school tests, there was a bias for B and C in multiple choice answers, or at least somebody had suggested that to you at least once. Don’t feel the same is true for GAMSAT as well, its not because GAMSAT test is highly randomized. I would rather suggest that you rule out these options in some of the questions as you may feel tempted to mark a C or a B. But even then, do not leave any questions blank its good to fill all the left out questions and if you feel you may change some answers here and there.

Even while you are taking you chance on guess work. Watch for answers that seem decisive. Like, X happens under all circumstances or all of the above kind of answers, unless you are absolutely sure about them. Again, if the question has two answers that are similar it may turn out to be one of these two. Also, an answer which looks completely different from the rest may be the correct answer. These tips may help you guess answers effectively or even check the correctness of an answer. Making smart guesses will help you get maximum correct answers even if you are guessing them than just leaving the questions blank.

So, to succeed in section 1 of the GAMSAT test, it is best to be aware of the following types of poetry and some of the poets known for using the form:

The Sonnet

• A 14 line lyric poem
• A Petrarchan (Italian) sonnet is divided into an octave (the first 8 lines) and a sestet (the last 6 lines). The octave establishes a situation or problem and the sestet provides an answer.
• A Shakespearean (English) sonnet is divided into three quatrains (lots of 4 lines) and a rhyming couplet (last 2 lines). The four quatrains develop the subject of the poem and the couplet comments upon the preceding 12 lines.
• Traditionally, a sonnet is a love poem. However, some poets have used it for other themes as well.
• The most well-known sonnet writers were Shakespeare, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, John Keats, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Robert Frost, W.B. Yeats, Wilfred Owen, W.H. Auden and Seamus Heaney.

The Ode

• A lyrical verse written to praise someone or written about an object that inspired the poet.
• The ode was popular amongst the Romantic poets, with William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge and John Keats all having composed some of the most well known odes in the English Language.

The Elegy

• A reflective, mournful poem written in lament of the dead.
• Amongst the most well-known elegy writers were Alfred Lord Tennyson and W.H. Auden.

The Ballad

• A lyrical narrative poem designed to tell a story.
• Most ballads are structured using four line stanzas.
• Well-known poets who used the ballad form quite often were William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

The Dramatic Monologue

• A spoken verse which gives insight into the speaker’s thoughts and feelings. A dramatic monologue usually follows the speaker through a narrative/story they wish to tell.
• The most famous poet in the ‘dramatic monologue’ category was Robert Browning, alongwith Sylvia Plath who also wrote in a similar fashion.

The Epic/Narrative

• The epic is a lengthy narrative poem that is usually broken into several parts. It normally details heroic deeds and significant historical events. Shorter epic poems are known as epyllia and generally have a romantic mythological theme.
• Well-known poets who wrote epics include William Wordsworth, William Blake, John Keats, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Alfred Lord Tennyson.

Make sure you familiarise yourself with these common forms of poetry before sitting for GAMSAT 2010. The form the poem takes can help you identify the purpose, themes and ideas contained within the poem with greater ease. The more background knowledge you can bring to the GAMSAT test, the easier it will be for you to comprehend any unseen poems you may face in the Humanities section of the test.

Flow-charts are schematic representations of some particular process or phenomenon, expressed step-wise. The motive behind a flow-chart creation is to simplify the whole process or phenomenon. Yet, there is enough scope to use logical understanding and collate various attributes or parameters. It concentrates on visually presenting a data flow through an information processing system, the operations performed within the system and the sequence of action. The key components of a typical flow-chart are – arrows, boxes, circles.  To understand the details of how a flowchart works, let us study an example –

The above flow-chart shows the operating details of an alarm clock. Uni-directional arrows show the flow of events in that particular direction or step-wise arrangements from beginning to end. A brief description of the events is given inside the boxes or the circles. To understand a flow chart, we must start at the beginning, that is, ‘Start’. When an alarm rings, it implies that we wake up from sleep on hearing it ring and climb out of bed, which is the end of the process. But, there is another alternative pattern shown here. Sometimes, even after hearing the alarm, if we don’t feel like getting up, we hit the snooze button. This immediately stops the alarm and delays it for 5 mins. Therefore, after 5 mins the alarm will ring again, repeating the cycle. From this flow-chart, it can also be noted that an individual will hit the snooze button on an average of 3 times before finally getting up. From this we can also conclude that an individual may not always be ready to get up from bed after hearing the first alarm. In other words, he/ she may need a buffer time to adjust from her sleeping condition and be mentally ready to wake up.

So, we have now understood how to collate various factors and come to a correct conclusion when analysing a flow-chart. It is evident that no concepts or previously learnt facts play any kind of role in the analysis of Flow-charts. Only logic and correct reasoning come to play. Keeping this attribute in mind, ACER has included Flow charts in the Section III of the GAMSAT test. Aspirants should practice answering Flow-chart related questions, as much as possible, for the GAMSAT test. Remember, practice makes things perfect.

The Romantic Movement

1. William Wordsworth –The Prelude, Strange Fits of Passion Have I Known and The Daffodils.
2. Samuel Taylor Coleridge – Kubla Khan and This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
3. William Blake – The Lamb, The Tyger and A Poison Tree
4. Percy Bysshe Shelley – Ozymandias and Ode to the West Wind
5. John Keats – To Autumn, Ode on a Grecian Urn and Ode to a Nightingale
6. Lord Byron – Don Juan

The Victorians

1. Alfred Lord Tennyson – Mariana, The Lady of Shallot, The Lotus-Eaters, Ulysses and In Memoriam
2. Elizabeth Barrett Browning – Sonnets from the Portuguese
3. Robert Browning – My Last Duchess, Porphyria’s Lover and The Laboratory
4. Gerard Manley Hopkins – The Caged Skylark and As Kingfishers Catch Fire
5. Matthew Arnold – Dover Beach

The Modernist Movement

1. T.S. Eliot – The Lovesong of J Alfred Prufrock, The Wasteland, The Hollowmen and Rhapsody on a Windy Night
2. Ezra Pound – The Cantos
3. W.H. Auden – The Unknown Citizen, Funeral Blues and In Memory of W.B. Yeats
4. W.B. Yeats – The Lake Isle of Innisfree, The Wild Swans at Coole, Easter 1916, The Second Coming and Sailing to Byzantium
5. Dylan Thomas – Fern Hill, In the White Giant’s Thigh and Death Shall Have No Dominion
6. Sylvia Plath – Ariel, Daddy, Tulips and Lady Lazarus
7. Ted Hughes – The Hawk in the Rain, Hawk Roosting, Fulbright Scholars, The Shot, Your Paris and Red
8. Seamus Heaney – Mid-Term Break, Blackberry Picking and Digging

Familiarising yourself with these poets and their works will help you immensely in preparing for GAMSAT Section I. It would be a good idea to read the poems listed here to familiarise yourself with the similarities between the poets listed in each movement and to get a feel of the various themes, poetic styles and motifs you can expect from each poet.

It is important to remember that this is not an exhaustive list, but a rather useful introduction to poetry. You may not get one of the poems listed in this article for GAMSAT, but you may get one of the poets and/or a poem from the same movement. Either way, exposing yourself to these poets and poems will give you a solid grounding in poetry, making you more comfortable with the prospect of deconstructing an unseen poem during the GAMSAT test.