How the Black Mamba Got Its Names: teacher key

Black Mambas, grade 9 edition, written for 9th grade. The black mamba up close: where it lives, its size and colours, its names and family, its reported speed and movement, its senses, its day, its food, its venom, painkilling proteins found in it, its conservation status and how it breeds.

Read the book. Print this page for the key.

Questions and answers

1. Who named the black mamba Dendraspis polylepis in 1864?
   • Günther (answer)
   • Peters
   • Guinness
2. What did the team that found mambalgins begin by searching for?
   • Snake eggs
   • Chemicals that could block ASICs (answer)
   • Fossils
3. What was described in 2015 for black mambas from Eastern Africa?
   • The home range
   • The egg tooth
   • The venom proteome (answer)
4. How does a black mamba pick up particles from the air?
   • It flicks out its tongue and places them in the vomeronasal organ (answer)
   • It breathes through its tail
   • It listens with outer ears
5. The 2017 review studied the venom of 42 of 360 Elapidae species. What does this suggest?
   • All were studied
   • Most of these venoms had not yet been studied (answer)
   • None were studied
6. What does proteome mean in: the venom proteome of black mambas?
   • A snake's range
   • A kind of egg
   • The full set of proteins (answer)

Words

• undulation: wavy movement
• vomeronasal: smell organ
• Elapidae: snake family
• neurotoxic: harming nerves
• proteome: all proteins
• mambalgins: painkilling proteins