- series of chemical reactions

- Living green plants + sunlight as energy source create carbon dioxide and water.

- Then it makes the carbon dioxide into sugar and oxygen

The Tectonic Cycle:

creation and destruction of the lithosphere

Lithosphere = outer layer of Earth.

The movement of these plates are called plate tectonics

- Plates float on denser material and more

- driven by forces originating deep within the Earth

- change the location and size of continents

-altering atmospheric and ocean circulation

- therefore altering climate

- can create islands

- When the islands are formed evolution must take place because some species are moved from habitat.

- consists of numerous processes that produce rocks and soils

- depends of the tectonic cycle for energy and hydrologic cycle for water

- Rocks classified as:

- igneous, sedimentary, metamorphic

- Process of converting atmospheric N to NO₃- or NH₄+

- almost all organisms depend on these

- some have formed symbiotic relationships in the roots of plants or stomach on animals

required in large amounts

C

H

N

O

P

S

* at reginal & local level, the funadmental hydrologic unit of the landscape is this*

-the area that contributes surface runoff to a particular streatm or river

-usually used to evaluate the hydrology of an area

-millions of tons of carbon are burned each year and end up somwhere unknown to science

- Marine or land photosynthesis, or both must provide the additional flux

- Happends when the rocks freeze and then thaw

- produces sediment such as gravel, sand and silt

1. Structure

- made up of living and nonliving

2. Process

- cycling of chemical elements and flow of energy

3. Change

- undergo development through succession

- A set of interacting species found in the same place and functioning together to maintain life

- Operational definition = all the species found in an area, whether or not they interact

- Use energy from the sun and carbon dioxide from the air to photosynthesize

- green plants, algae and certain bacteria

- called autotrophs

* grasses, herbs and trees

- Organisms that feed on autotrophs

- called herbivores

* mice, pine borer and deer

- feed directly on herbivores

- called carnivores

* foxes, wolves, hawks

Forth Trophic Level

- Carnivores that feed on third level carnivores

* Humans

- Feed on waste and dead organisms of all trohpic levels

- bacteria and fungi

- would be considered on the fourth trophic level

- A species that has a large effect on its community or ecosystem

* wolf, alligator

- its removal or a change in its role within the ecosystem changes the basic nature of the community

Example: North American Temperate Woodland

1st- grasses, herbs and trees

2nd- mice pine borer and deer

3rd- foxes wolves hawks

4th- humans

* Involve more species and have more trohpic levels

- Sea otters have community level effect

- where more kelp is present more habitat for many species

When one species effects nonliving and living communities

- refers to the variety of life forms in an area

* expressed as number of species in an area

* or number of genetic types in an area

- Explanation of diversity known as biological evolution

- refers to the change in inherited characteristics of a population from generation to generation

- When cells divide

- DNA is reproduced

- each cell gets a copy

- if an error occurs in teh reproduction of DNA it gets passed to new cells

DNA Change = Mutation

- some individuals may be better suited to the env. than others

- those better able to survive and reproduce leave more offspring

- their descendants form a larger proportion of the next generation

- two populations become geographically isolated for a long time

- enough change accumulates so that they no longer reproduce

- two new species have formed

- migration important evolutionary process ( hawaii honey creeper and Darwin's finches)

- occurs when changes in the frequency of a gene in a pop are due not to mutation, selection, or migration, but simply to chance.

-Happns through the founder effect

Genetic Diversity

How many of which species on Earth?

- 1.5 have been named

- most are insect or plants

- many species of fungi and protists

- relatively few mammals

- Two species that have exactly the same requirements cannot coexist in exactly the same habitat

* British red squirrel and American Grey squirrel

- Information contained in DNA is enormous

- we now have the ability to manipulate inherited characteristics

- new possibilities pose novel problems