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Environment Science
Science rules
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Ecosystem | A biological community of interacting organisms and their physical environment. |
| Species | A group of living organisms consisting of similar individuals capable of exchanging genes or interbreeding. The species is the principal natural taxonomic unit, ranking below a genus and denoted by a Latin binomial. |
| Community | A group of interdependent organisms of different species growing or living together in a specified habitat. |
| Population | A community of animals, plants, or humans among whose members interbreeding occurs. |
| Biotic Factors | Living parts of an ecosystem. |
| Biome | A large naturally occurring community of flora and fauna occupying a major habitat. |
| Biosphere | The regions of the surface, atmosphere, and hydrosphere of the earth occupied by living organisms. |
| Food Web | A system of interlocking and interdependent food chains. |
| Food Chain | A hierarchical series of organisms each dependent on the next as a source of food. |
| Biochemical Cycle | The pathway by which a chemical substance cycles (is turned over or moves through) the biotic and the abiotic compartments of Earth. |
| Water Cycle | The cycle of processes by which water circulates between the earth's oceans, atmosphere, and land, involving precipitation as rain and snow, drainage in streams and rivers, and return to the atmosphere by evaporation and transpiration. |
| Carbon Cycle | The series of processes by which carbon compounds are interconverted in the environment |
| Nitrogen Cycle | The series of processes by which nitrogen and its compounds are interconverted in the environment and in living organisms. |
| Phosphorus Cycle | A biogeochemical cycle that describes the movement through the lithosphere, the hydrosphere, and biosphere. |
| Abiotic Factors | Non-living factors that impact the ecosystem. |
| Trophic Levels | Food levels. |
| Niche | An organisms role in life. |
| Autotroph | An organism that is able to form nutritional organic substances from simple inorganic substances such as carbon dioxide. |
| Heterotroph | An organism deriving its nutritional requirements from complex organic substances. |
| Herbivore | Organisms that feed off of only plants. |
| Carnivore | Organisms that feed off of only meat. |
| Decomposer | an organism, especially a soil bacterium, fungus, or invertebrate, that decomposes organic material. |
| Keystone species | A species on which other species in an ecosystem largely depend, such that if it were removed the ecosystem would change drastically. |
| Photosynthesis | The process by which green plants and some other organisms use sunlight to synthesize foods from carbon dioxide and water. |
| Producers | Plants. |
| Primary Consumers | Herbivores. |
| Secondary Consumers | Omnivores and herbivores. |
| Tertiary Consumers | Carnivores. |
| Food Pyramid | A graphic representation of predatory relationships in the food chain, in which various forms of life are shown on different levels, with each level preying on the one below it. |
| Symbiosis | interaction between two different organisms living in close physical association, typically to the advantage of both |
| Mutualism | the doctrine that mutual dependence is necessary to social well-being. |
| Parasitism | the practice of living as a parasite in or on another organism |
| Commensalism | an association between two organisms in which one benefits and the other derives neither benefit nor harm. |
Created by:
Lez
Popular Ecology sets