Topic 7 - Ecology Flashcards
(27 cards)
1
Q
What is a habitat?
A
place where organism lives
2
Q
What is a population?
A
all organisams of one species living in a habitat
3
Q
What is a community?
A
populations of different species living in a habitat
4
Q
What is an ecosystem?
A
interaction of a community of living organisms with non living parts of their environment
5
Q
What are functional adaptations?
A
- things that go on inside organisms body that can be related to processes like reproduction and metabolism
6
Q
Water cycle?
A
- energy from sun makes water evaporate from land and sea- turns into water vapor (also plants) - transpiration
- warm water vapour carried upwards - when gets higher up it cools and condenses to form clouds
- water falls from clouds as precipitation onto land - provides fresh water
7
Q
Carbon cycle?
A
- CO2 removed from atmosphere by green plants and algae during photosynthesis - carbon used to make glucose - turned into cabs, fats, proteins that make up bodies of plants and algae
- plants and algae respire - carbon returned to atmosphere by CO2
- when plants and algae eat by animals - carbon in fats and proteins passed through food chain
- when animals respire - carbon returned to atmosphere through CO2
- when animals die and decay - broken down by microorganisms that respire
- combustion of wood and releases CO2
8
Q
What does the rate of decay depend on?
A
- temperature - increased rate of enzymes
- oxygen - many decomposers need oxygen to respire
- water - decay faster in moist environments
- number of decay organisms
9
Q
What is biogas?
A
- made by anaerobic decay of waste material
- mainly made up of methane which can be burned as a fuel
10
Q
What are batch generators?
A
- make biogas in small batches
- manually loaded up with waste
11
Q
What are continuous generators?
A
- make biogass all the time
- waste continuously fed in - biogas produced at steady rate
12
Q
Decay method?
A
- measure 5cm3 of lipase soltution- add to a test tube - label L for lipase
- measure 5cm3 of milk- add to different test tube - add 5 drops of phenolpthalein
- measure out 7cm3 of sodium carbonate solution - add to milk - make soltuion in tube alkaline - pink
- put both tubes in water bath at 30°C - leave them to reach temp - thermometer
- use calibrated dropping pipette to put 1cm3 of lipase solution into milk tube - start stopwatch
- stir contents of tube with glass rod - enzyme starts to decompose milk
- when solution loses pink colour - stop stopwatch and record how long colour change took in table
- repeat at different temperatures - 3 times at each temp - calcualte mean
13
Q
Rate of decay unit and formula?
A
- rate = 1000/time
- units s-1
14
Q
How does destroying peat bogs add more CO2 to the atmosphere?
A
- when peat is drained - comes into contact with more air - microorganisms decay it
- these organisms respire - releasing CO2
- CO2 also released when peat burned as fuel
15
Q
What is trophic level 1?
A
- contains producers
- organisms at start of food chain - called producers because they produce their own food via photosynthesis
16
Q
What is trophic level 2?
A
- primary consumers
- herbivores that eat plants are primary consumors
17
Q
What is trophic level 3?
A
- secondary consumers
- carnivores that eat primary consumers
18
Q
What is trophic level 4?
A
- tertiary
- carnivores that eat other carnivores
19
Q
What are decomposers?
A
decompose dead plant or animal left in environment
20
Q
How is biomass lost between each trophic level?
A
- organisms dont eat every part of organism they consume
- organisams dont absorb all stuff in food they ingest - stuff not absorbed egested as faeces
- some biomass taken in converted into other substances lost as waste
21
Q
How can you calculate efficiency of biomass transfer?
A
biomass transferred to next level / biomass available at previous level
22
Q
How can fish stocks be maintained?
A
- fishing quotas - limits on number and size of fish ahat can be caught in certain areas - prevents certain species being overfished
23
Q
How can food production be made more efficient?
A
- limit movement of livestock and keep them in temperature improved environment
- reduced transfer of energy from livestock to environment
- more efficient as animals use less energy moving around and controlling their own body temperature
24
Q
What is mycoprotein?
A
- meat substitute made from the fungus Fusarium
- used to make high-protein meat substitutes for vegetarian meals
25
How can biotechnology help crops?
- GM crops can be produced that are resistant to pests
- can be GM to grow better in drought conditions and provide more nutritional value
25
How can bacteria be engineered to produce human insulin?
- plasmid removed from bacterium
- insunlin gene cut out of human chromosome using restsriction enzyme - cut leaves one of DNA strands with unpaired bases - sticky end
- plasmid cut open using same restriction enzyme - leaving same sticky ends
- plasmid and human insulin gene mixed together
- ligase added - joins sticky ends together to produce recombinant DNA
- recombinant DNA inserted into bacterium
- modified bacterium grown in a vat under controlled conditions - end up with millions of bacteria that produce insulin - insulin harvested and purified to treat people with diabeties
26
Why do some people disagree with biotechnology?
- people argue people go hungry because they cant afford food - not because there isnt any
- poor soil reason crops fail - GM crops wont survive
- countries may become dependent on companies who sell GM seeds
