Midterm :) Flashcards
Interdisciplinary study that uses information and ideas from the physical sciences, with those fromt he social sciences and humanities to learn how nature works, how we interact with the environment, and how we can to help deal with environmental problems
Environmental Science
Biological science that studies the relationships between living organisms and their environment; study of the structure and functions of nature
Ecology
Natural resources and natural servies that keep us and other species alive and support our economies
Natural Capital
Materials such as air, water, and soil and energy in nature that are essential or useful to humans
Natural Resources
Proceses of nature, such as purification of air and water and pest control, which support life and human economies
Natural Servies
Social movement dedicated to protecting the earth’s life support systems for us and other species
Environmentalism
One or more communities of different species interacting with one another and with the chemical and physical factors making up their nonliving environment
Ecosystems
Ability of earth’s various systems, including human cultural systems and economies, to survive and adapt to changing environmental conditions indefinitely
Sustainability
Growth in which some quantity, such as population size or economic output, increases at a constant rate per unit of time. An example is the growth sequence 2,4,8,16,32… which increases at 100% each interval. When the increase in quantity over time is plotted, this type of growth yields a curve shaped like the letter J
Exponential Growth
Anything obtained from the environment to meet human needs and wants. It can also be applied to other species
Resources
Resources that can be replenished rapidly(hours to decades)/ resource that exists in a fixed amount and has the potential for renewal over hundreds of millions to billions of years/ essentially inexhaustible resource on a human time scale
Renewable/ Nonrenewable/ Perpetual Resources
Highest rate at which a potentially renewable resource can be used indefinitely without reducing its available supply
Sustainable Yield
Amount of biologically productive land and water needed to supply a population with the renewable resources it uses and to absorb or dispose of the wastes from such resource use. It is a measure of the average environmental impact of populations in different countries and areas
Ecological Footprint
Depletion or degradation of a potentially renewable resource to which people have free and unmanaged access. An example is the depletion of commercially desirable fish species in the open ocean beyond areas controlled by coastal countries
Tragedy of the Commons
Depletion or destruction of a potentially renewable resource such as soil, grassland, forest, or wildlife that is used faster than it is naturally replenished. If such use continues, the resource becomes nonrenewable or nonexistent
Environmental Degradation
Device, process, or strategy used to prevent a potential pollutant from forming or entering the environment or to sharply reduce the amount entering the environment
Pollution Prevention
Device or process that removes or reduces the level of a pollutant after it has been produced or has entered the environment. Examples include automobile admission control devices and sewage treatment plant
Pollution Cleanup
Country that is highly industrialized and has a high per capita GDP
Developed Country
Country that has low to moderate industrialization and low to moderate per capita GDP
Developing Country
Maximum population of a particular species that a given habitat can support over a given period
Carrying Capacity
Compounds containing carbon atoms combined with each other and with atoms of one or more other elements such as hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur, phosphorus, chlorine, and fluorine
Organic Compounds
Whenever energy is converted from one form to another in a physical or chemical change, no energy is created or destroyed, but energy can be changed from one form to another; you cannot get more energy out of something than you put in; in terms of energy quantity, you cannot get something for nothing. This law does not apply to nuclear changes, in which large amounts of energy can be produced from small amounts of matter
First Law of Thermodynamics
Whenever energy is converted from one form to another in a physical or chemical change, we end up with lower-quality or less usable energy than we started with. In any conversion of heat energy to useful work, come of the initial energy input is always degraded to lower-quality, more dispersed, less useful energy- usually low-temperature heat that flows into the environment; you cannot bread even in terms of energy quality
Second Law of Thermodynamics
Energy stored in an object because of its position or the position of its parts
Potential Energy
Energy that matter has because of its mass and speed, or velocity
Kinetic Energy
Anything that has mass and takes up space. On the earth, where gravity is present, we weigh an object to determine its mass
Matter
Matter that is concentrated and contains a high concentration of a useful resource
High-Quality Matter
Matter that is dilute or dispersed or contains a low concentration of a useful resource
Low-Quality Matter
In any physical or chemical change, matter is neither created nor destroyed but merely changed from one form to another; in physical and chemical changes, existing atoms are rearranged into different spatial patterns or different combinations
Law of Conservation of Matter
Organism that uses solar energy or chemical energy to manufacture the organic compounds it needs as nutrients from simple inorganic compounds obtained from its environment
Producer
Organism that feeds on some or all parts of plants or on other producers
Primary Consumer
Organism that feeds only on primary consumers
Secondary Consumer
Animals that feed on animal-eating animals. They feed at high trophic levels in food chains and webs.
Tertiary Consumer
Organism that digests parts of dead organisms, and cast-off fragments and wastes of living organisms by breaking down the complex organic molecules in those materials into simpler inorganic compounds and then absorbing the soluble nutrients. Producers return most of these chemicals to the soil and water for reuse
Decomposers
Complex process that takes place in cells of green plants. Radiant energy from the sun is used to combine carbon dioxide and water to produce oxygen, carbohydrates, and other nutrient molecules
Photosynthesis
Process in which certain organisms extract inorganic compounds from their environment and convert them into organic nutrient compounds without the presence of sunlight
Chemosynthesis
natural processes that recycle nutrients in various chemical forms from the nonliving environment to living organisms and then back to the nonliving environment.
biogeochemical cycles
biogeochemical cycles
carbon; oxygen; nitrogen; phosphorus; sulfur; and hydrologic
Nonliving
abiotic
living
biotic
series of organisms in which each eats or decomposes the preceding one
food chain
complex network of many interconnected food chains and feeding relationships
food web
process by which humans select one or more desirable genetic traits in the population of a plant or animal species and then use selective breeding to produce populations containing many individuals with the desired traits
artificial selection
GMO; organism whose genetic makeup has been altered by genetic engineering
transgenic organism
species whose decline serves as early warnings that a community or ecosystem is being degraded
indicator species
species that play roles affecting many other organisms in an ecosystem
keystone species
species that plays a major role in shaping a community by creating and enhancing a habitat that benefits other species
foundation species
species that normally live and thrive in a particular ecosystem
native species
species that migrate into an ecosystem or are deliberately or accidentally introduced into an ecosystem by humans
nonnative species
species with a narrow ecological niche; they may be able to live in only one type of habitat, tolerate only a narrow range of climatic and other environmental conditions, or use only one type or a few types of food
specialist species
species with a broad ecological niche; they can live in many different places, eat a variety of foods, and tolerate a wide range of environmental conditions
generalist species
variety of species, measured by the number of different species contained in a community
species richness
total way of life or tole of a species in an ecosystem; it includes all physical, chemical, and biological conditions that a species needs to live and reproduce in an ecosystem
niche
place or type of place where an organism or population of organisms lives
habitat
two or more individual organisms of a single species (intraspecific) or two or more individuals of different species (interspecific) attempting to use the same scarce resources in the same ecosystem
competition
interaction in which an organism of one species captures and feeds on some or all parts of organism of another species
predation
an interaction between organisms of different species in which one type of organism benefits and the other type is neither helped nor harmed to any great degree
commensalism
type of species interaction in which both participating species generally benefit
mutualism
interaction between species in which one organism preys on another organism by living on or in the host
parasitism
pattern in which exponential population growth occurs when the population is small, and population growth decreases steadily with time as the population approaches the carrying capacity
logistic growth
maximum rate at which the population of a given species can increase when there are no limits on its rate of growth
biotic potential
all of the limiting factors that act together to limit the growth of a population
environmental resistance
evolution in which two or more species interact and exert selective pressures on each other that can lead each species to undergo adaptations
coevolution
ecological succession in an area without soil or bottom sediments
primary succession
ecological succession in an area in which natural vegetation has been removed or destroyed but the soil or bottom sediment has not been destroyed
secondary succession
single factor that limits the growth, abundance, or distribution of the population of a species in an ecosystem
limiting factor
increase or decrease in the size of population; equal to (births+immigrations)-(deaths+emigrations)
population change
annual number of live births per 1000 people in the population of a geographic area at the midpoint of a given year
crude birth rate
all organisms that are the same number of energy transfers away from the original source of energy that enters an ecosystem
trophic level
organic matter produced by plants and other photosynthetic producers; total dry weight of all living organisms that can be supported at each trophic level in a food chain or web; dry weigh of all organic matter in plants and animals in an ecosystem; plant materials and animal wastes used as fuel
biomass
range of chemical and physical conditions that must be maintained for populations of a particular species to stay alive and grow, develop, and function normally
range of tolerance
point at which an environmental problem reaches a threshold level, which causes an often irreversible shift in the behavior of a natural system
ecological tipping point
warming of the earth’s lower atmosphere (troposphere) because of increases in the concentrations of one or more greenhouse gases; it can result in climate change that can last for decades to thousands of years
global warming
change in the genetic makeup of a population of a species in successive generations; if continued long enough, it can lead to the formation of a new species
evolution
process by which a particular beneficial gene is reproduced in succeeding generations more than other genes; the result of this is a population that contains a greater proportion of organisms better adapted to certain environmental conditions
natural selection/ survival of the fittest
phenomenon in which individuals with adaptive genetic traits produce more living offspring than do individuals without such traits
differential reproduction
separation of populations of a species into different areas for long periods of time
geographic isolation
random change in DNA molecules making up genes that can alter anatomy, physiology, or behavior in an offspring
mutation
normal extinction of various species as a result of changes in loval environmental conditions
background extinction rate
catastrophic, widespread, often global event in which major groups of species are wiped out over a short time compared with normal extinctions
mass extinction rate
long-term geographic separation of members of a particular sexually reproducing species
reproductive isolation
species that is found in only one area; such species are especially vulnerable to extinction
endemic species
insertion of an alien gene into an organism to give it a beneficial genetic trait
genetic engineering
three principles of sustainability
- reliance on solar energy
- biodiversity
- chemical cycling (nutrient cycling)
key environmental problems
- population growth
- wasteful and unsustainable resource use
- poverty
- exclusion of environmental costs of resource use from the market prices of goods and services
environmental impact of a population depends upon…
- ecological footprint
- IPAT: Impact= Population x Affluence x Technology
scientific limitations
- cannot prove or disprove anything absolutely, there is always some degree of uncertainty
- scientists are human and not totally free form bias
- many systems in the natural world involve a huge number of variables with complex interactions
- the use of statistical tools to estimate numbers
- cannot be applied to moral or ethical questions
carrying capacity
environmental threshold
- alteration to water cycle
- carbon cycle
- nitrogen cycle
- phosphorus cycle
- sulfur cycle
- withdrawal of large amounts of freshwater
- clearing vegetation
- increased flooding when wetlands are drained
- tree clearing
- burning fossil fuels
- burning fossil fuels
- commercial inorganic fertilizer or animal manure
- destruction of forests, grasslands, and wetlands
- agricultural runoff
- harvesting nitrogen rich crops
- clearing forests
- making fertilizers
- erosion
- burning coal and oil
- refining petroleum
- converting metallic mineral ores
earth’s life support systems
atmosphere; hydrosphere; geosphere; and biosphere
life on earth depends on…
the flow of energy, the cycling of nutrients, and gravity
ecological organization
- atom
- molecule
- cell
- organism
- population
- community
- ecosystem
- biosphere
the ability to reproduce quickly; characteristics: high fecundity, small body size, early maturity onset, short generation time, and the ability to disperse offspring widely
r-selection
the ability to compete successfully for limited resources; characteristics: large body size, long life expectancy, and the production of fewer offspring
K-selection
carrying capacity
environmental threshold
population age diagrams
expanding rapidly
expanding slowly
stable
declining
how to reduce ecological footprint
reuse, reduce, recycle
Types of diversity
- species diversity
- genetic diversity
- ecosystem diversity
- functional diversity
- biodiversity
