Elemental Cycling pt. 2

Question 1

What is vital to plant growth and found in every living plant cell?

Answer 1

Phosphorous

Question 2

What plant functions is phosphorous involved in?

Answer 2

energy transfer
nutrient movement

Question 3

T or F

The atmosphere is NOT an important part of the phosphorous cycle because phosphorous does not have a gaseous phase.

Answer 3

TRUE

Question 4

What is the phosphorus cycle?

Answer 4

phosphorous enters the food web through rock weathering, the P particles then dissolve in water and are absorbed through plant roots

Question 5

What are the two major limiting nutrients for NPP in terrestrial environments?

Answer 5

Nitrogen
Phosphorous

Question 6

Why have the soils near the tropics experienced weathering for a long time?

Answer 6

they were not covered by ice during last ice age

they experience more precipitaiton today

Question 7

T or F

Tropical soils, like Georgia red clay, hold nutrients well.

Answer 7

FALSE

they do not hold nutrients well…nutrients flow too deep to be accessed by plant roots

Question 8

Leibig’s law of the minimum

Answer 8

states that an organism’s growth is not determined by total nutrients, but by scarcest nutrient…limiting factor

Question 9

Latitudinal Diversity gradient

Answer 9

we see greater biodiversity at the equator as compared to the poles

NOT explained by climate or nutrient availability alone

Question 10

This difference in geological past of land near vs. far from the equator resulted in differences in …..

Answer 10

extinction, migration, and speciation across latitudes

Question 11

Species near the poles today…

Answer 11

spectated or migrated there after the last ice age (species in polar regions during the ice age went extinct)