Question | Answer |
organism | a living thing |
habitat | an environment that provides the things the organism needs to live, grow, and reproduce |
biotic factor | the living parts of a habitat |
abiotic factor | the nonliving parts of a habitat |
photosynthesis | the process organisms using water and sunlight and carbon dioxide that make their food |
species | a group of organisms that are physically similar and can mate with each other and produce offspring that can mate and reproduce |
community | all the different populations that live together |
ecosystem | the community of organisms that live in a particular area along with their nonliving surroundings |
ecology | the study of how living things interact with each other and their environment |
estimate | an approximation of a number based on reasonable assumptions |
birth rate | the number of births in a population in a certain amount of time |
death rate | the number of deaths in a population in a certain amount of time |
immigration | moving into a population |
emigration | leaving a population |
population density | the number of individuals in an area of a specific size |
limiting factor | an environmental factor that causes a population to decrease |
carrying capacity | the largest population that an are can support |
natural selection | a characteristic that makes an individual better suited to its environment may eventually become common in that species through this process |
adaptations | the behaviors and physical characteristics that allow organisms to live successfully in their environment |
niche | the role of an organism in its habitat or how it makes its living |
competition | the struggle between to organisms to survive as they attempt to use the same limited resource |
predation | the organism that does the killing |
predator | the organism that does the killing |
prey | the organism that gets killed |
symbiosis | a close relationship between two species that benefits at least one species |
mutualism | a relationship that benefits both species |
commensalism | a relationship in which one species benefits and the other species is neither helped nor harmed |
parasite | the organism that benefits from the parasite |
host | the organism that the parasite lives inside |
succession | the series of predictable changes that occur in a community over time |
primary species | the series of changes that occur in an area where there is no soil or organism exists |
pioneer species | the first species to populate the area |
secondary succession | the series of changes that occur in an area where the ecosystem has been disturbed |