Components of Biodiversity 3.7

Question 1

What are the components on biodiversity?

Answer 1

Components of biodiversity are genetic diversity, species diversity and ecosystem diversity.

Question 2

What is genetic diversity?

Answer 2

Genetic diversity is the number and frequency of all the alleles within a population.

Question 3

What happens when a species loses some of its genetic diversity?

Answer 3

If one population of a species dies out then the species may have lost some of its genetic diversity, and this may limit its ability to adapt to changing conditions.

Question 4

What is species diversity?

Answer 4

Species diversity comprises the number of different species in an ecosystem (the species richness) and the proportion of each species in the ecosystem (the relative abundance).

Question 5

Which has a higher species diversity: a community with a dominant species or a community with the same species richness but no particularly dominant species?

Answer 5

A community with a dominant species has a lower species diversity than one with the
same species richness but no particularly dominant species.

Question 6

What is ecosystem diversity?

Answer 6

Ecosystem diversity refers to the number of distinct ecosystems within a defined area.