Second review Flashcards
Conservation
Preservation, protection, or restoration of the natural environment, natural ecosystems, vegetation, and wildlife.
Preservation
Protected place for animals or plants. To keep in original state without changing it.
Keystone Species
A species on which other species in an ecosystem largely depend, such that if it were removed the ecosystem would change drastically.
Indicator Species
An animal or plant species that can be used to infer conditions in a particular habitat.
Nitrogen Fixing
Nitrogen fixation is a process by which nitrogen in the Earth’s atmosphere is converted into ammonia (NH3) or other molecules available to living organisms. Atmospheric nitrogen or molecular dinitrogen (N2) is relatively inert: it does not easily react with other chemicals to form new compounds.
Ammonification
Bacteria are able to convert ammonia to nitrite and nitrate but they are inhibited by light so this must occur below the euphotic zone. Performed by bacteria to convert organic nitrogen to ammonia. Nitrification can then occur to convert the ammonium to nitrite and nitrate.
Nitrification
The biological oxidation of ammonia or ammonium to nitrite followed by the oxidation of the nitrite to nitrate.
Assimilation
The process by which a person or persons acquire the social and psychological characteristics of a group.
Denitrification
A microbially facilitated process where nitrate is reduced and ultimately produces molecular nitrogen (N2) through a series of intermediate gaseous nitrogen oxide products.
Sustainability
Avoidance of the depletion of natural resources in order to maintain an ecological balance.
Natural Selection
The differential survival and reproduction of individuals due to differences in phenotype. It is a key mechanism of evolution, the change in heritable traits of a population over time.
Biotic and Abiotic
Abiotic factors refer to non-living physical and chemical elements in the ecosystem. Biotic factors are living or once-living organisms in the ecosystem.
Autotroph
An organism that produces complex organic compounds from simple substances present in its surroundings, generally using energy from light or inorganic chemical reactions.
Secondary Succession
The series of community changes which take place on a previously colonized, but disturbed or damaged habitat. Examples include areas which have been cleared of existing vegetation (such as after tree-felling in a woodland) and destructive events such as fires.
R Strategist
Those species that produce many “cheap” offspring and live in unstable environments.
K Strategist
Those species that produce few “expensive” offspring and live in stable environments.
Positive Feedback
The enhancement or amplification of an effect by its own influence on the process that gives rise to it. A feedback loop in which the effects of a small disturbance on a system include an increase in the magnitude of the perturbation.
Negative Feedback
The diminution or counteraction of an effect by its own influence on the process giving rise to it, as when a high level of a particular hormone in the blood may inhibit further secretion of that hormone, or where the result of a certain action may inhibit further performance of that action.
Malthus
The principle that human populations grow exponentially (i.e., doubling with each cycle) while food production grows at an arithmetic rate (i.e. by the repeated addition of a uniform increment in each uniform interval of time).
Replacement Level Fertility
The total fertility rate—the average number of children born per woman—at which a population exactly replaces itself from one generation to the next, without migration.
Biome
A large naturally occurring community of flora and fauna occupying a major habitat, e.g., forest or tundra.
Parasitism
The practice of living as a parasite in or on another organism. A relationship between two organisms where one is usually harmed and the other gets benefits from the relationship.
Biomagnification
The concentration of toxins in an organism as a result of its ingesting other plants or animals in which the toxins are more widely disbursed.
Bioaccumulation
The accumulation of substances, such as pesticides, or other chemicals in an organism. When an organism absorbs a substance at a rate faster than that at which the substance is lost by catabolism and excretion.
Thermodynamics
The branch of physical science that deals with the relations between heat and other forms of energy (such as mechanical, electrical, or chemical energy), and, by extension, of the relationships between all forms of energy.
