Ch. 2

Question 0

biosphere

Answer 0

portion of Earth that supports life

Question 1

ecology

Answer 1

the scientific discipline in which the relationships among living organisms and the interaction the organisms have with their environments are studied

Question 2

biotic factors

Answer 2

living factors in an organism’s environment

Question 3

abiotic factors

Answer 3

nonliving factors in an organism’s environment

Question 4

population

Answer 4

individual organisms of a single species that share the same geographic location at the same time

Question 5

biological community

Answer 5

group of interacting populations that occupy the same geographic area at the same time

Question 6

ecosystem

Answer 6

biological community and all abiotic factors that affect it

Question 7

biome

Answer 7

large group of ecosystems in the same climate and have similar types of communities

Question 8

habitat

Answer 8

area where an organism lives

Question 9

predation

Answer 9

act of one organism pursuing and consuming another organism for food

Question 10

symbiosis

Answer 10

close relationship that exists when two or more species live together

Question 11

mutualism

Answer 11

relationship between two or more organisms that live closely together and benefit from eachother

Question 12

commensalism

Answer 12

relationship in which one organism benefits and the other organism is neither helped nor harmed

Question 13

parasitism

Answer 13

a symbiotic relationship in which one organism benefits at the expense of another organism

Question 14

autotroph

Answer 14

an organism that collects energy from sunlight or inorganic substances to produce food

Question 15

heterotrophs

Answer 15

an organism that gets its energy requirements by consuming other organisms

Question 16

omnivores

Answer 16

organisms that eat both plants and animals

Question 17

detrtivores

Answer 17

eat fragments of dead matter in an ecosystem, return nurtrients to the soil, air, and water where the nutrients can be reused my organisms

Question 18

tropic level

Answer 18

each step in a food chain or food web

Question 19

food chain

Answer 19

simple model that shows how energy flows through an ecosystem

Question 20

food web

Answer 20

model representing the many interconnected food chains and pathways in which energy flows through a group of organisms

Question 21

biomass

Answer 21

total mass of living matter at each trophic level

Question 22

biogechemical cycle

Answer 22

exchange of matter through the biosphere

Question 23

nitrogen fixation

Answer 23

process of capture and conversion of nitrogen into a form that is usable by plants

Question 24

denitrification

Answer 24

process in which some soil bacteria convert fixed nitrogen compounds back into nitrogen gas, which returns it to the atmosphere.