Lecture 2: Ecological Experiments Flashcards
What is the definition of ecology?
The scientific study of interactions between organisms and their environment in a hierarchy of levels or organization: individuals, populations, communities, and ecosystem
What are the 5 organizational levels of organismal life from most complex to least complex?
Biosphere: all space occupied by living things on earth
Ecosystem: A region containing interacting abiotic and biotic features
Community: A population of species that occur together in the same space and time
Population: Individuals of the same species that co-occur in space and time
Individual: living entities that are genetically and physically discrete
What is autoecology? What is an example?
Branch that focuses on the interactions between individuals (or individual species) with their environment.
Often (but not always) examines the behaviour and physiology of individuals
Example: What do caribou eat and when?
What is population ecology? What is an example?
Focuses on understanding processes that influence population structure and dynamics such as birth and mortality rates
Example: How does hunting effect wildlife?
What is community ecology? What is an example?
Focuses on understanding interactions between species or factors that influence the structure of entire communities.
Example: How does plant community composition change in response to rising CO2?
What is ecosystem ecology? What is an example?
Focuses on understanding how organisms and chemical/physical processes interact. Energy flow and nutrient cycling are key features of this discipline. Example: How do wildfires affect soil nutrient cycling in forests?
What is landscape ecology? What is an example?
Study on how landscape patterns influence ecological processes, and vice versa. A key study area here is how human altered landscapes influence organismal movement.
Example: effect of roads on animal movement, and effect of natural areas on agro-ecosystems
What is macroecology? What is an example?
Study of processes at large spatial scales, such as region, a continent or several continents. often focuses on organismal abundance, distribution, and diversity.
Example: what are the drivers of woody plant diversity in China?
What is global ecology? What is an example?
Study of processes at the global scale with relevance for all life processes, global climate change is a key study area.
Example: effect of different CO2 emission scenarios on global extinction rates
What is an ecosystem?
An arbitrarily defined geographic volume containing interacting abiotic and biotic factors, connected to their ecosystems by a series of inputs and outputs. They have a time dimension, and humans may or may not be part of the system.
Can be big or small
What are the abiotic factors of an ecosystem? (6)
water
air
temperature
light
salinity
heavy metals
What are the biotic factors of an ecosystem?
plants
animals
fungi
bacteria
unicellular eukaryotes
TRUE OR FALSE
Ecosystems change through time
TRUE
Do humans always have detrimental effects on an ecosystem? Are we always a part of the ecosystem?
Not always detrimental and not always a part of it
What are the 6 steps in order of the scientific method?
Observations
Question
Hypothesis
Prediction
Test of prediction (experiment)
Iteration
