2.3 - Flows Of Matter Flashcards
Define gross secondary productivity
The total amount of stuff (energy or biomass) that’s taken in and assimilated by a consumer.
An example is all the food that an animal takes in, subtracting what it releases as faeces.
Define gross primary productivity
The total amount of energy/matter assimilated by a producer (e.g. a plant), before it gets used by the plant for respiration.
Define net secondary productivity
The food that an animal consumes, with fecal losses AND respiration subtracted. This is basically what is available to the next trophic level.
Define net primary productivity
The amount of energy/biomass that a producer takes in that it actually keeps (and doesn’t use for respiration).
Maximum sustainable yield
This is equivalent to NPP or NSP (depending on the context). It’s basically the amount of
“useful” stuff that is produced by a system.
How to calculate NPP
GPP - R
How do you calculate GSP
Food eaten - fecal loss
How do you calculate NSP
GSP - R
What are the storages of the carbon cycle
Producers
Consumers
Decomposers
Fossils & sediment
Atmosphere
Oceans
Soil
What are flows in the carbon cycle
Photosynthesis
Respiration
Feeding
Death + decomposition
Fossilisation
Combustion
Dissolving sediment
What are the storages of the nitrogen cycle
Producers plant protein
Consumers animal protein
Soil/organic matter
Atmosphere
Water
Miscorbes
What are the flows of the nitrogen cycle
Nitrogen fixation
Nitrification
Denitrification
Feeding
Excretion
Dearth + decomposition
Outline ways in which humans influence flows
our use of fosoil fuel has allowed us to use the sun’s energy that was previously trapped by plants and inaccessible for millions of years. This increased amount of available energy has alowed us to massively increase agricuttural output, which has lead to increased population growth. It has also led to many environmental issues such as enhanced greenhanse gas emissions, deforestation (for agricultural land) and disruption of natural aques.
Explain the impact off the Industrial Revolution on the carbon cycle
This led to increased burning of fossil fuels which increased the amount of co2 in the atmosphere, leading to global warming and climate change. mining and burning of fossil fuels reduced the storages of these non-renewable sources of energy and increased the storage of corbon in the atmosphere This can lead to increased vegetation growth, increasng storage in biomass
Outline the ways in which the agriculture industry has influences the nitrogen cycle
Agricutture removes biomass from one area and moves it to another so that the nitrogen compounds cannot be recycled. Often the nitrogen is lost in the sea as sewage.
This depletes the area of nitrogen so nitrogen is acided by farmers in the form of fertiliser.
