Free Support and Movement MCQs with Answers

• A. 200
• B. 206
• C. 213
• D. 306

Explanation: An adult has 206 bones, 80 in the axial skeleton and 126 in the appendicular skeleton.

• A. Femur
• B. Clavicle
• C. Sternum
• D. Scapula

Explanation: The axial skeleton is the central supporting column: skull, vertebral column, ribs and sternum.

• A. 5
• B. 12
• C. 4
• D. 7

Explanation: There are seven cervical vertebrae, and the number is seven in almost all mammals, including the giraffe, whose neck is long because each…

• A. humerus
• B. tibia
• C. femur
• D. fibula

Explanation: The femur is the thigh bone, roughly a quarter of a person's height, and it carries the whole body weight during walking, so its shaft is…

• A. Cardiac muscle
• B. Skeletal muscle
• C. Smooth muscle
• D. None of the three

Explanation: Cardiac muscle has the cross striations of skeletal muscle because it uses the same actin and myosin arrangement, but it contracts…

• A. myofilament
• B. sarcomere
• C. sarcolemma
• D. sarcoplasmic reticulum

Explanation: A sarcomere is the region between two Z lines, containing overlapping thick and thin filaments, and the whole muscle shortens because…

• A. I band
• B. H zone
• C. Sarcomere
• D. A band

Explanation: The A band is the full length of the thick myosin filaments, and since the filaments themselves do not shorten, the A band stays the same…

• A. actin filaments slide inwards over the myosin filaments
• B. both actin and myosin filaments themselves shorten
• C. the sarcomere is stretched by the load
• D. the Z lines dissolve and reform further apart

Explanation: Myosin heads bind actin, swivel, and drag the thin filaments towards the centre of the sarcomere, then detach and repeat, so the filaments…

• A. the myosin heads
• B. tropomyosin directly
• C. troponin, which moves tropomyosin off the binding sites on actin
• D. ATP, activating it

Explanation: In a relaxed fibre tropomyosin lies across the myosin binding sites of actin.

• A. calcium ions disappear from the sarcoplasm
• B. ATP is no longer available to detach the myosin heads from actin
• C. the muscle proteins are denatured by the fall in body temperature
• D. acetylcholine continues to be released at the neuromuscular junction

Explanation: ATP is needed not to form a cross bridge but to break one, so when respiration stops and ATP runs out the myosin heads stay locked on…

• A. noradrenaline
• B. dopamine
• C. acetylcholine
• D. GABA

Explanation: Acetylcholine diffuses across the synaptic cleft and depolarises the sarcolemma, and the resulting action potential spreads down the T…

• A. hinge joint
• B. ball and socket joint
• C. pivot joint
• D. gliding joint

Explanation: The rounded head of the femur sits in the cup shaped acetabulum, which allows movement in all planes plus rotation, the widest range any…

• A. Elbow
• B. Shoulder
• C. Hip
• D. Wrist

Explanation: The elbow is a hinge joint, so it permits flexion and extension but no rotation, in the same way as the knee and the joints of the…

• A. knee joint
• B. shoulder joint
• C. joint between the skull and the atlas
• D. joint between the atlas and the axis

Explanation: The atlas rotates around the odontoid process of the axis, and this pivot joint carries the skull with it.

• A. to lubricate the joint and nourish the articular cartilage
• B. to produce red blood cells
• C. to store calcium for the body
• D. to carry nerve impulses across the joint

Explanation: Synovial fluid is secreted by the synovial membrane into the joint cavity, where it reduces friction between the cartilage surfaces and…

• A. an autoimmune attack on the synovial membrane
• B. deposition of uric acid crystals in the joint
• C. gradual wear and degeneration of the articular cartilage
• D. bacterial infection of the joint cavity

Explanation: Osteoarthritis is a mechanical, degenerative condition in which the articular cartilage thins with age and use until bone rubs on bone, so…

• A. a purely degenerative disease of old age
• B. an autoimmune inflammation of the synovial membrane
• C. a deficiency of calcium in the diet
• D. a fungal infection of the bone marrow

Explanation: In rheumatoid arthritis the immune system attacks the body's own synovial membrane, which becomes inflamed and thickened and eventually…

• A. calcium phosphate
• B. cholesterol
• C. collagen fibres
• D. sodium urate crystals

Explanation: Gout follows a raised blood level of uric acid, the end product of purine breakdown, which crystallises as sodium urate in a cool…

• A. a Haversian system
• B. a sarcomere
• C. a lacuna
• D. the periosteum

Explanation: A Haversian system, or osteon, is the cylindrical unit of compact bone: rings of hard matrix around a canal carrying a blood vessel and a…

• A. fibrous cartilage
• B. elastic cartilage
• C. calcified cartilage
• D. hyaline cartilage

Explanation: Hyaline cartilage is smooth, glassy and slightly compressible, so it lets bone ends slide over each other with very little friction while…