BIOL 3130 Lecture Notes - Intertropical Convergence Zone, Alpine Tundra, Rain Shadow

65 views4 pages

blushmosquito8

1 Aug 2012

School

University of Guelph

Department

Biology

Course

BIOL 3130

Professor

For unlimited access to Class Notes, a Class+ subscription is required.

Document Summary

Chapter 52: ecology and the distribution of life. Ecology: scientific study of the rich and varied interactions between organisms and their environment. Communities: embracing all the organisms living together in the same area. Ecosystems: embracing all organisms in an area plus their physical environment. Biosphere: system that embraces all regions of the planet where organisms live. Environment: encompasses both abiotic and biotic factors. Climate of a region is the average of the atmospheric conditions found over a long term. Weather is the short-term state of those conditions. Climates vary greatly because different places receive different amounts of solar energy. Every place on earth receives the same total number of hours of sunlight but not the same amount of solar energy; this depends primarily on the angle of sunlight. Higher latitudes experience greater variation in both day length and the angle or arriving solar energy over the course of a year = greater seasonal variation in temperature.

Related Questions

Please Help. Thank you very much.

Ecology is the study of how organisms interact with their environment. Thus, a central question in ecology concerns how organisms respond to environmental variation. The flip side of this question is to ask whether the variation in characteristics of organisms is the result of variation in features of the environment. This variation can occur in space or through time.

1. Make a list of all the environmental variables that you can think of that are likely to be important to organisms. Think about plants and microbes as well as animals.

1A. One environmental change of great concern to us is climate change, specifically the prospect of human-caused global warming, a topic to which we will return. How do organisms respond to this spatial and temporal variability in the environment?

Ecosystems overlap. Mainly because the "borders" of them are grey areas blending into the next type of habitat. One constant is the weather. Now, the weather is "local" and "climate" is global. (This is why it's called Global Climate Change.) The climate between ecosystems brings different weather patterns and thus change that can affect the organisms present.

We polluted our seed's water to model the effects of Acid Rain. Did you know that the acid rain that affects the Pacific Northwest, where you as an organism are now living, comes from air pollution produced in Asia?

Think. Using your new bioliteracy and Ecology knowledge...

1) Why is it important to think about biosphere change being "global" rather than ecologically "local"?

1. Late stage succession communities typically: a) contain more equilibrial than opportunistic species b) are more diverse than disturbed communities c) are more diverse than early stage succession commmunities d) contain more opportunistic species than equilibrial species e) suffer higher rates of disturbance

2. Phenotypic plasticity is when: a) Organisms adapt their genotype to the local environment b) Individuals with different phenotypes show plasticity in their size c) Organisms with different genotype express different phenotypes in the same environment d) Plasticity in the environment causes different genotypes to survive leading to different phenotypes e) Organisms express different phenotypes depending on the local environment but have the same genotype

3. Terrestrial areas that are saturated with water, either permanently or seasonally, are typically known as what type of ecosystem. f) Grasslands g) Heathlands h) Litholands i) Wetlands j) Littoral

4. Briefly explain two ways that excess climate gas emissions are changing the worldâs physical environment

BIOL 3130 Lecture Notes - Intertropical Convergence Zone, Alpine Tundra, Rain Shadow

Document Summary

Get access

Related Documents

BIOL 3130 Lecture Notes - Tropical And Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests, Temperate Deciduous Forest, Intertropical Convergence Zone

BIOL 3130 Lecture Notes - Detritivore, Species Richness, Directional Selection

BIOL 3130 Lecture Notes - Chthamalus Stellatus, Trophic Level, Interspecific Competition

Related Questions