Biomolecules
Amino acids, protein structure, enzyme kinetics, and nucleic-acid handling as they appear in figures.
MCAT biology is not a second pass through intro bio. The AAMC mixes cellular and molecular biology, organ systems, and biochemistry into passages that ask you to read an experiment and apply a mechanism, not recite a chapter title.
The Biological and Biochemical Foundations of Living Systems section sits on cells, tissues, organ systems, and the chemistry that keeps them running. Passages often give an unfamiliar figure or a short methods paragraph, then ask what happens if a transporter, enzyme, or hormone changes.
You still need the vocabulary of mitosis, membranes, and metabolism. The scoring difference is whether those facts stay attached to a graph, a knockout, or a patient vignette. Chemistry/Physics and CARS are separate jobs; this page stays on the living-systems stack.
Amino acids, protein structure, enzyme kinetics, and nucleic-acid handling as they appear in figures.
Membranes, organelles, the cell cycle, Mendelian and molecular genetics, and gene expression.
Nervous, endocrine, cardiovascular, respiratory, renal, digestive, immune, and reproductive function at the MCAT grain.
Glycolysis, the citric acid cycle, oxidative phosphorylation, and how tissues shift fuel use.
Use this if biology is a weak or rusty section. Pair it with the existing full-exam MCAT plan if you are covering all four sections at once.
Weeks 1–4
Rebuild the map of cells and organ systems from one content source. After each chapter, write cards for mechanisms and exceptions, not every bold word.
Weeks 5–8
Switch the day so a discrete or passage set comes before rereading. Misses that are durable facts become cards the same day.
Weeks 9–12
Protect a daily review block. New cards only replace facts that still leak on mixed sets. Full-lengths belong to the whole MCAT, not this deck alone.
Active recall for MCAT biology means explaining a result: why oxygen-hemoglobin binding shifts, why a nephron segment reabsorbs glucose, why a mutation changes an enzyme’s Km. If the card only names the organ, it will feel easy and fail on test day.
Spaced repetition is for the facts you will see again in new clothes. Pathways, hormones, and transporters belong in the deck. Long narrative summaries of a chapter do not. Use the calculator below to see whether a few hundred targeted cards fit the weeks you still have.
Sketch a pathway or nephron from memory, then card only the steps you could not place.
Hide one axis, control, or conclusion from a practice figure and ask what changes.
Ask “what rises if X is blocked?” instead of “define X.”
A 400-card Bio/Biochem deck at 40 minutes a day over 90 days. Adjust if you are also running Chem/Phys and Psych/Soc decks.
Estimate: 30 seconds per new card, 10 seconds per review. Fixed review gaps, not FSRS or a recall prediction.
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No. CARS is a reasoning skill. You can card recurring question patterns, but daily timed passages do more than vocabulary cards.
That page sequences all four sections. This page is the Biology/Biochem slice: what to card, what to leave as practice, and a calculator prefilled for a systems deck.
You need the properties the AAMC uses in passages: charge, polarity, disulfide bonds, and common catalytic roles. Card those, then practice them inside figures.
About ten days before the exam, stop adding. Reviews and full-length review take the remaining time.
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