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
