Ecology

Question 1

Organism

Answer 1

An individual living thing

Question 2

Population

Answer 2

Consists of all the individuals of a species living in a specified area

Question 3

Community

Answer 3

The entire array of organisms inhabiting a particular ecosystem

Question 4

Ecosystem

Answer 4

Consists of all the organisms living in a particular area as well as the nonliving physical components of the environment with which all the organisms interact such as air, soil, water, and sunlight

Question 5

Biome

Answer 5

A large geographical areas of land that share an average climate

Question 6

Biosphere

Answer 6

Consists of all the environments on earth that can support life- most regions of land, bodies of water, and the lower atmosphere

Question 7

Each of the levels of organization that apply to ecology

Answer 7

Organism
Population
Community
Ecosystem
Biom
Biosphere
Organism  Population  Community  Ecosystem Biome  Biosphere

Question 8

Difference between how energy and nutrients travel through and ecosystem

Answer 8

Energy flows throughout an ecosystem and nutrients cycle through an ecosystem. Energy flows because a lot of it is lost through heat and cannot be returned to the sun. Nutrients are cycled from the environment to producers to consumers to decomposer to then breaks down the nutrients and release them back into the soil.

Question 9

What is the 10% rule and why is it flawed

Answer 9

Every time an organism eats another organism, the eater only obtains 10% of the energy and 90% of the energy is lost through heat. Only 10% of energy is transferred between each trophic level. It is flawed because some argue that the percentage is an inappropriate measurement because sometimes it's a little less or a little more than 10%.
100% to 10% to 1% to .1% to .01%
if beginning is 7,000 kcal
700
70
7
.7
.07

Question 10

Negative feedback loops

Answer 10

Minimizes the effect of a disturbance and returns the systems to the normal states like thermostats and shivering. If a change causes climate warming that leads to increased evaporation and cloud cover, the NEGATIVE part of the cycle is decreased incoming solar radiation that leads to cooling.

Question 11

Positive feedback loops

Answer 11

Increases the effect of the disturbance and can destabilize a system and return to a normal state may be impossible like Eutrophication on the ocean. If an initial change causes climate warming which leads to increased atmospheric water vapor, the POSITIVE loop leads to increased greenhouse tapping of radion that leads to increased warming

Question 12

Difference between Positive and negative feedback loops

Answer 12

Negative loops are good and stabilizes a system and a positive loop is bad and destabilizes a system

Question 13

Ecology

Answer 13

The study of interactions between organisms and their environment. Ecology changes how we think about the ecosystem and environments with the new information found with ecology

Question 14

Abiotic/Biotic

Answer 14

Non-living/living things. Changes how we think about things that are alive/ not alive and how they interact and influence each other

Question 15

Weather/climate

Answer 15

Weather is the state of the atmosphere (temperature, precipitation, etc) at a specific place and time. The weather of a large area over a long period of time is climate and changes how we think about what to wear, where to live, what kind of weather to prepare for as well as the condition of our earth and climate change

Question 16

Photosynthesis/chemosynthesis

Answer 16

The process by which plants, autotrophic protists, and some bacteria use energy to make sugars and other organic food molecules from carbon dioxide. Chemosynthesis is the synthesis of inorganic compounds using energy derived from reactions in organic chemicals, typically int he absence of sunlight. Changes how we think about how energy flows through ecosystems/ how energy is created from nutrients
Chemo-used by bacterua who live in darkness and it is making sugars and food out of chemicaks Changes how we think energy flow is created or started in different ecosystems
Sunlight v. Darkness and maybe we can study it and figure out how to create our own energy.

Question 17

How is climate change studied

Answer 17

Through actual measurements of precipitation, temperacture, etc and through measuremenrs of things that have been effected by climate. And through knowing the fluctuating amounts of carbon dioxide

Question 18

The impact of climate change on the biosphere

Answer 18

is that organisms/life is being changed by global warming as a result of the green house effect. Climate change causes animals and plants to have to adapt to be able to survive in these new conditions and in this adaption, many organisms die off as a result of natural selection. Climate change decreases the amount of plants and animals on earth

Question 19

What is global warming

Answer 19

Global warming is climate change in climates of different areas all over the world are getting warmer than they used to be.

Question 20

Why did global warming happen

Answer 20

Because of the green house effect

Question 21

What is the green house effect

Answer 21

When carbon/greenhouse gasses wrap around our planet and keeps it warm despite the coldness of space. Global warming is when the blanket gets too thick as a result of fossil fuels and our change in is warmed too much.

Question 22

Exponential growth curve

Answer 22

• lag phase and then big J curve
• Seen in populations that grow by a fixed percent every year
• humans and bacteria

Question 23

Carrying capacity- why is it never stable

Answer 23

Because limiting factors pop up and become adapted to so those limiting factors may increase/decrease carrying capacity

Question 24

Logistic growth curve

Answer 24

-Happens when exponential growth becomes limited by environmental factors
-lag phase- > growth-> pressure due to environmental resistance happens and line kind of flattens out into carrying capacity that fluctuates a little
S curve

Question 25

Density dependent limiting factors

Answer 25

Factors like food supply, parasites, disease, competition, and predation that depend on the population

Question 26

Density independent limiting factors

Answer 26

Factors like rainfall, flood, acidity, drought, that do not depend on the populations of organisms. Environmental factors

Question 27

Ways to estimate population size

Answer 27

Capture and release
Point quarter sampling
Growth rate

Question 28

Growth rate

Answer 28

Used for Both mobile and sedentary populations. The slope of the growth. Mostly used for populations growing at a pretty fixed rate

Question 29

Point quarter sampling

Answer 29

Organisms in certain regions are counted, divided by number of regions and multiplied by the number of grids/area
Used for only sedentary populations as mobile populations may move regions while counting occurs

Question 30

Capture and release

Answer 30

Used for mobile populations. Some organisms are captured, marked, and then released to mingle. More organisms of the same population are recaptured and the number of the marked organisms recaptured gives and estimate of the population.
Only for mobile populations

Question 31

Directional graph

Answer 31

Hump in either really left or really right. Mean is very more left or right. Like only dark butterflies are favored and seen more often

Question 32

Stabilizing graph

Answer 32

One middle mean. Hump is in the middle of the graph. Only brown butterflies are favored while while and dark are less favored

Question 33

Disruptive graph

Answer 33

Two favored traits, two humps. Mean is still in the middle, but may be favoring one hump more than the other
White and dark are favored, but not get