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Ecology Ontiveros
Ecology Terms
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| Ecology | Scientific study of interactions among organisms and their environment (pg 63) |
| Biosphere | Part of Earth in which life exists including land, water, and air or atmosphere (pg 63) |
| Species | Group of similar organisms that can breed and produce fertile offspring (pg 64) |
| Population | Group of individuals of the same species that live in the same area (pg 64) |
| Community | Assemblage of different populations that live together in a defined area (pg 64) |
| Ecosystem | A collection of all the organisms that live in particular place, together with their nonliving environment (p 64) |
| Autotroph | Organism that can capture energy from sunlight or chemicles and use it to produce its own food from inorganic compounds; also called a producer (pg 67, 201) |
| Heterotroph | Organism that obtains energy from the foods it consumer; also a consumer (pg 68, 201) |
| Food Web | Network of complex interactions formed by the feeding relationships among the various organisms in an ecosystem (pg 70) |
| Trophic Level | Step in a food chain or food web (p 70) |
| Biomass | Total amount of living tissue within a given trophic level (pg 72) |
| Biogeochemical Cycle | Process in which elements, chemical compounds, and other forms of matter are passed from one organism to another and from one part of the biosphere to another (pg 74) |
| Limiting Nutrient | Single nutrient that either is scarce or cycles very slowly, limiting the growth of organisms in an ecosystem (p 80) |
| Weather | Condition of Earth's atmosphere at a particular time and place (p 87) |
| Climate | Average year-after-year conditions of temperature and prcipitation in aparticular region |
| Greenhouse Effect | Natural situation in which heat is retained in Earht's atmosphere by carbon dioxide, methane, water vapor, and other gases (p 87) |
| Biotic Factor | Biological influence on organisms within an ecosystem (p 90) |
| Abiotic Factor | Physical, or nonliving, factor that shapes an ecosystem (p 90) |
| Niche | Full range of physical and biological conditions in which an organism lives and the way in which the organisms use those conditions (p 91) |
| Logistic Growth | Growth pattern in which a population's groth rate slows or stops following a period of exponential groth (p 122) |
| Carrying Capacity | Largest number of individuals of a population that a given environment can support (p 122) |
| Demography | Scientific study of human populations (p 130) |
| Demographic Transition | Change in a population from high birth rates and death rates to low birth and death rates (p 130) |
| Green Revolution | The development of highly productive crop strains and the use of modern agricultural techniques to increase yields of food crops (p 142) |
| Renewable Resource | Resource that can regenerate quickly and that is replaceable (p 144) |
| Carrying Capacity | Largest number of individuals of a population that a given environment can support (p 122) |
| Demography | Scientific study of human populations (p 130) |
| Demographic Transition | Change in a population from high birth rates and death rates to low birth and death rates (p 130) |
| Green Revolution | The development of highly productive crop strains and the use of modern agricultural techniques to increase yields of food crops (p 142) |
| Renewable Resource | Resource that can regenerate quickly and that is replaceable (p 144) |
| Pollutant | Harmful material that can enter the biosphere through the land, air, or water (p 148) |
| Biodiversity | Biological diversity; the sum total of the variety of organisms in the biosphere (p 150) |