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| Study of the interactions between organisms and the living and non-living components of their environment. |
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| All organisms interact with other organisms in their surroundings and with the non living portion of their environment. Their survival depends on these interactions. |
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| The thin volume of Earth and its atmosphere that supports life. |
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| Represents or describes the components of an ecological system. Help understand interactions and allow them to make predictions about possible changes. |
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| Thin volume of Earth and its atmosphere that supports life. |
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| Includes all organisms and non-living environment found in a particular place. |
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| All interacting organisms living in an area. |
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| All the members of a species that live in one place and one time. |
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| The place where an organism lives |
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| The living components of the environment including all of the living things that affect the organism |
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| The non-living factor, the physical and chemical characteristics of the environmen. This includes humidity, pH, temperature, oxygen concentration, amount of sunlight, and more. |
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| A graph of performance versus values of an environmental variable, such as temperature, pH, and amount of sunlight. |
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| Adjusting their tolerance to abiotic factors. |
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| Organisms that do not regulate their internal conditions; they change as their environment changes. For example, reptiles must move to sunlight to gain heat energy and to maintain body temperature. They cannot change body temperature. |
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| Organisms that use energy to control some of their internal conditions. These organisms keep an internal condition within the optimal range over a wide variety of environmental conditions. For example, mammals can change body temperature using internal mechanisms. |
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| State of reduced activity for a certain time period, such as winter or drought. |
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| Moving to a more favorable habitat |
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| The specific role or way of life, of an organism within its environment. How an organism makes a living. |
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| Species with broad niches. They can tolerate a range of conditions and use a variety of resources. |
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| Species that have narrow niches. |
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| Plants and some kinds of protists and bacteria capable of manufacturing their own food through photosynthesis and chemosynthesis |
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| Use of energy stored in inorganic molecules to produce carbohydrates. |
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| Organic material that has been produced in the ecosystem |
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| Heterotrophs, obtaining energy by consuming organic molecules made by other organisms. |
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| Consumers that eat producers |
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| Consumers that eat other consumers |
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| Consumers that eat both consumers and producers |
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| Consumers that feed on dead organisms |
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| Indicates the organism's position in a sequence of energy transfers |
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| A single pathway of feeding relationships among organisms in an ecosystem that results in energy transfer. |
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| Interrelated food chains in an ecosystem |
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| Recycling of energy and matter through an ecosystem |
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| Plants take in water through their roots, and they release water and take in carbon dioxide through their leaves. |
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| The process of converting Nitrogen gas to nitrate. |
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| Bacteria that transform nitrogen gas into a usable form. Plants give carbohydrates to these bacteria and bacteria gives fixed nitrogen to plants |
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| Breaking down nitrogen of dead bodies and excretions to ammonium |
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| Soil bacteria take up ammonium and oxidize it into nitrates |
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| Anaerobic bacteria break down nitrates and release nitrogen gas into the atmosphere. |
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| Amount by which a population's size changes in a given time |
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| movement of individuals into a population |
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| Movement of individuals out of the population. |
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| birth rate-death rate= growth rate |
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| A pattern of increase in number due to a steady growth rate |
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| Any factor that restrains the growth of a population |
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| Builds on the exponential model but accounts for the influence of limiting factors. |
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| The number of individuals the environment can support over a long period of time (K) |
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| Density-independent factors |
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| Factors such as weather, floods, and fires, reduce the population by the same proportion, regardless of the population's size |
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| Density-independent factors |
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| Include resource limitations, such as shortages of food or nesting sites, and are triggered by increasing population diversity. |
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| Mating with relatives; dangerous because of decreased genetic variability. Less chance of adaptation |
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| Large terrestrial ecosystems that contain a number of smaller but related ecosystems within them. |
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| Cold and largel treeless biome that forms a continuous belt across Northern America, Europe, and Asia |
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| Permanently frozen layer of soil under the surface, characterizes the tundra. |
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| Continuous layer of treetops that shades the floor |
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| Because of competition for sunlight, these organisms live on branches of tall trees. They use other organisms for support. Ex. vine, mosses, and orchids. |
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| Bear seeds in cones and tend to be evergreen |
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| Shed their leaves each year |
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| Temperate deciduous forests |
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| Area of trees that lose all their leaves in the fall and regrow them each spring. |
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| South of the tundra and north of the temperate regions. Forested biome dominated by coniferous trees and the evergreens. |
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| Dry, short grass in North America, Asia, Europe. Supports herds such as Buffalos |
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