BSC 108- Midterm Exam Guide - Comprehensive Notes for the exam ( 158 pages long!)
12 Oct 2017
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How do you define life: anything that is complex and made of chemicals, something that needs to eat food, life cannot be defined. It defies a simple, one-sentence definition: life is recognized by what living things do. They regulate themselves: called homeostasis: (cid:498)maintaining a steady state(cid:499) Theme 1: the scope of life and emergent properties. Molecules biosphere: life consists of a vertical hierarchy, novel properties emerge at each step due to the . Interactions: emerging properties are difficult to predict when you look at the properties at the lower levels of the hierarchy. Example of an emergent property: photosynthesis, put all the molecules required for photosynthesis in a test tube. Expose to light: photosynthesis will not occur, the specific orientation of the molecules is missing. Theme 2: organisms exchange matter and energy within ecosystems: every organism interacts with its environment. Plants use co2 to make food: all 02 in the atmosphere comes from photosynthesis.
