Exam 3 Terms

Question 1

Greenhouse Effect

Answer 1

Certain gases and chemicals that hold heat well, get stuck in our atmosphere (CO2 levels before Industrial revolution = 280ppm)

Question 2

Past Climate Proxies

Answer 2

Ice cores, sediment cores, tree rings, and historic documents provide surrogate records fro instrumental records

Question 3

Paleoclimatology

Answer 3

The study of climate variability in the time before records from modern observing instruments

Question 4

Milankovitch Cycles

Answer 4

“Pace maker of the ice ages”
E= Eccentricity
T= Tilt or obliquity
P= Precession

Question 5

Last Glacier Maximum (23k years ago)

Answer 5

• World was dry
• Lots of ice locked away fresh water and lowered sea levels
• Created extensive coastal plains

Question 6

The Last Deflection of North America (18k years ago)

Answer 6

• Glaciers that covered all the way down to Iowa

- Started receding North about 18k years ago

Question 7

The Younger Dryas

Answer 7

• Unusual cold event from 12.9k - 11.3k years ago
• Deglacier warming was rapidly reversed
• Possible ice damn broke causing temp change in ocean therefore continents

Question 8

Holocene Climate Optimum

Answer 8

• Warm period from 9k-5k years ago
• Strong alignment with Milankovich cycles
• Obliquity 24* and precession = perihelion in Boreal Summer
• Subtropics were MORE wet
• Help facilitate agricultural revolution
• Methane increase apparent from 500 years ago

Question 9

Volcanic Eruptions

Answer 9

• Can cause a drop in temp for 7 years (0.1* Celsius)

- Tropic volcanoes = most effective

Question 10

Forest-Free season length

Answer 10

Period from the last spring day to the first day with 32*F

Question 11

Positive Feedback

Answer 11

Occurs when the output of a system acts in the same direction as the input of the system

Question 12

Weather

Answer 12

What is gonna happen (prediction)

Question 13

Climate

Answer 13

What we think is gonna happen (projection)

Question 14

Representative Concentration Pathways (RCP)

Answer 14

Greenhouse gas concentrations under various scenarios for future socioeconomic and energy economics

Question 15

Clear Expectations from Climate Change

Answer 15

• Rising temps

- Hydrological Changes(warmer atmosphere holds more water

Question 16

Xylem (Wood)

Answer 16

Transports moisture/nutrients from roots up to canopy for photosynthesis

Question 17

Phloem (Bark)

Answer 17

Photosynthesis from canopy down into root system

Question 18

Vascular Cambian

Answer 18

Thin band of living meristematic tissue that divides to produce wood and bark

Question 19

Tree Ring

Answer 19

Band of wood produced by vascular cambium during growing season (usually caused by seasonality)

Question 20

Primary Growth

Answer 20

• Adds stem length

- Apical Meristem

Question 21

Secondary Growth

Answer 21

• Adds stem girth

- Cambial Meristem

Question 22

True Extinction

Answer 22

Disappearance of a species with no descendants (Ex. Wolly mammoth, Saber tooth, etc)

Question 23

Mass Extinction

Answer 23

Temporary discrete episodes with a very high rate of species loss (Ex. Dinos)

Question 24

Chixulub

Answer 24

Town located in the crater of the meteor that killed the dinos

Question 25

The 6th Mass extinction

Answer 25

-Claim that humans are responsible for this event

Question 26

Pleistocence Overkill Hypothesis

Answer 26

Human hunters armed with clovis spear points overheated naive American megafauna

Question 27

Linnaean Shortfall

Answer 27

• Predicted 8.7 million non bacterial species on Earth

- We’ve only discovered and named about 1.7 mill

Question 28

Causes of Extinction

Answer 28

CHIPPO

Climate change
Habitat loss
Invasive species
Pollution
Population (over population)
Overconsumption

Question 29

Umbrella Species

Answer 29

One whose conservation/preservation will potentially indirectly conserve other species of concern

Question 30

Minimum Viable Population

Answer 30

The number of individuals required for a species to have a 95% chance of survival for 100 years

Question 31

50/500 Rule

Answer 31

• 50 is the number of individuals needed to prevent inbreeding
• 500 Number of individuals needed to prevent and withstand stochastic perturbations

Question 32

Systematic Pressures

Answer 32

Pressures that can be predicted and controlled (Ex. hunting, releasing of chemicals, etc)

Question 33

Sochastic Perturbations

Answer 33

Difficult to predict as they are random

Question 34

Demographic Stochasticity

Answer 34

Survival odds with finite numbers

Question 35

Environmental Stochasticity

Answer 35

Habitat and species interactions changes

Question 36

Natural Catastrophe

Answer 36

Fire, floods, earthquakes, etc

Question 37

Genetic Stochasticity

Answer 37

Gene frequency changes, founder effect, inbreeding

Question 38

Metapopulation

Answer 38

A population consisting of many interacting populations

Question 39

Introduced Species

Answer 39

Species living outside its native range, having been moved to its new location by either deliberate or accidental transportations

Question 40

Deliberate Introductions

Answer 40

• Economic reason (moving livestock and feed so we can make food efficiently)
• Control other pests (Asian carp to clear ponds, Kudzu to control erosion)

Question 41

Accidental Introductions

Answer 41

• Some dude lost his pet python, now it competes for food with alligators and attacks them)
• Asian Carp (Brought to clean ponds, breed like crazy so now they are out of control and expanding though the Mississippi river)