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Nutrient Cycle
Question | Answer |
---|---|
________% of all water on earth is stored in the oceans as salt water. | 97% |
What are the 3 primary processes of the water cycle? | Evaporation, condensation, and precipitation |
What is the process of evaporation? | Evaporation refers to the transformation of a liquid to a gas. |
What is transpiration? | Evaporation that takes place from the leaves of plants. |
What is humidity? | The amount of water in the air. |
True or False: The warmer the air, the more water it can hold. | True! |
What makes air saturated? | When air is holding the maximum amount of water at a certain temperature, it is said to be saturated. |
How does condensation occur? | Condensation occurs when a gas cools into a liquid. Condensation occurs when saturated air is cooled. |
How does precipitation occur? | Precipitation occurs when water droplets suspended in clouds become too heavy to remain in suspension. These water droplets fall as rain, hail, sleet, or snow. |
True or False: Precipitation may not collect as surface water that drains into lakes, rivers, streams, and other bodies of water. | False! Precipitation may collect as surface water, which then drains into lakes, rivers, streams, and other bodies of water. |
What is groundwater? | Groundwater is water residing in the soil and rock below land surface. |
What is erosion? | The process of water transporting rock fragments. Erosion carries rock particles from elevated to lower areas. |
What are autotrophs? | Organisms that make their own food from simple substances. |
What are heterotrophs? | They depend on autotrophs, either directly or indirectly, for their food supply—they eat other organisms. |
Explain the carbon cycle. | The cycling from reservoirs (rocks, sediments, and the ocean), to the atmosphere (mostly as CO2), to organisms in food webs, and back to reservoirs. |
What does photosynthesis do? | Photosynthesis removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and uses it to build food molecules. |
What does cellular respiration do? | Cellular respiration involves the breakdown of these food molecules, resulting in the release of carbon dioxide gas. |
What happens through decomposition? | Through the process of decomposition, much of their carbon is returned to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. |
Which of the following would release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere? the burning of fossil fuels, volcanic eruptions, cellular respiration | All of them |
Why is carbon dioxide considered a greenhouse gas? | Carbon dioxide is called a greenhouse gas because it has the property of retaining radiant heat |
Nitrogen makes up about ______% of Earth's atmosphere. This is the reservoir of nitrogen of living things. | 80% |
How is nitrogen absorbed by living things? | From the soil as a nutrient. |
What is the first phase of the nitrogen cycle? | Some species of bacteria and archaea convert atmospheric nitrogen into nitrogen compounds into the soil. |
What is the second phase of the nitrogen cycle? | Plants absorb nitrogen compounds from the soil and change it into their own molecules. |
What is the third phase of the nitrogen cycle? | Animals receive nitrogen compounds when they eat plants. |
What is the fourth phase of the nitrogen cycle? | Both animals and plants return nitrogen compounds to the soil through waste and decomposition. |
What is the fifth phase of the nitrogen cycle? | Some bacteria decompose nitrogen compounds in the soil into nitrogen gas. |
What are the processes of the nitrogen cycle called? | fixation, mineralization (ammonification), nitrification, and denitrification. |
What can cause an algal bloom? | Runoff rich in nitrogen compounds. |
What does the phosphorus cycle involve? | The phosphorus cycle involves the transfer of phosphorus, primarily in the form of phosphate (PO43–) between rocks, soil, water, and organisms. |
What is the main source of phosphorous compounds to an ecosystem? | Rock weathering. |
Which of the following processes does not contribute to carbon cycling? Condensation, photosynthesis, combustion, respiration | Condensation |
Phosphorous is an important component in which of the following? ATP, DNA, Both, Neither | Both |
Nitrogen is a primary elemental component of which of the following? DNA + Amino Acids, Sugars + DNA, Fats + Amino Acids, Sugars + Amino Acids | DNA + Amino Acids |
What is the order of the water cycle? | Condensation, Precipitation, Evaporation, Condensation.... |
True or False: Organisms breathe in nitrogen gas as part of the nitrogen cycle | False! |
What is an accurate comparison of watersheds and aquifers? | one involves water collection above ground and the other below ground |
What is true of the phosphorus cycle but NOT the water cycle? | It does not include a gaseous form. |
Phosphorous on the oceanic floor comes from several sources but does not come from ________. | rain water |
True or False: Most precipitation falls on land before flowing to oceans. | False! Most precipitation falls into the oceans. |
Plants absorb phosphorous through their ________ and animals obtain it from ________. | roots; food |