Hydrological Cycle
When water changes from the liquid to the gaseous phase this is called?
Evaporation
Carbon is important for?
It is the backbone of all living things. Carbs, Lipids, Proteins, DNA, even fossil fuels and plastics are made of carbon.
Organisms require phosphorus for?
ATP, DNA/RNA/ phospholipid bilayer of cell membranes, limiting nutrients for plants
What do organisms use nitrogen for?
proteins and DNA and limiting nutrients for plants
These two elements are typically limited in the environment and control plant growth
Nitrogen and Phosphorus
Then trees and plants release water from their leaves this is called?
Transpiration
These two processes take carbon out of the atmosphere.
photosynthesis, and sedimentation
Phosphorus comes from or enters the cycle through?
Rocks- weathering
Explain WHY we NEED the nitrogen cycle
The atmosphere is 78% Nitrogen gas (N2) but MOST organisms are not able to use it in this form.
These two actions of humans disrupt the carbon cycle
Deforestation and combustion of fossil fuels.
When water moves through the soil this is called?
infiltration and percolation
There two processes put carbon into the atmosphere.
When plants absorb phosphorus from the soil and water and make it part of their tissue this is called?
Assimilation
What is the first step of the nitrogen cycle? Give one way this happens
Nitrogen fixation
lightning, bacteria on the roots of legumes, cyanobacteria in the ocean, and humans artificially make fertilizers using fossil fuels.
Two ways humans could improve their negative impacts to the water cycle include:
Reduce the amount of impervious/impermeable surfaces.
Leave trees in place to store water and provide transpiration.
Stop taking so much water from aquifers for irrigation.
Percolation leads to?
Ground water/aquifers
When carbon dioxide is absorbed and released by the ocean this is called?
Exchange
What do decomposers do in the phosphorus cycle?
return phosphorus to the soil to reenter the cycle
How does nitrogen move through the biosphere?
Through the food chain-consumption. Plants assimilate nitrogen, then each organisms takes in nitrogen by eating plants or animals.
What is eutrophication?
When runoff carries nitrogen and phosphorus into bodies of water it overfeeds the algae leading to algal blooms.
Humans create more run off by?
Coating the surface of earth with impervious/impermeable surfaces like asphalt and concrete
Sedimentation and burial leads to?
Sedimentary rock and or fossil fuel formation
How does phosphorus cycle through the biosphere- how do organisms obtain phosphorus?
consumption
How do humans impact the nitrogen cycle
By making nitrogen based fertilizer and then spreading it for agriculture where it is carried by runoff into bodies of water where it causes algal blooms.
Three ways humans disrupt the phosphorus cycle include?
1) Mining
2) Fertilizers
3) Detergents.