Mixed 1
What is the abiotic reservoir for carbon?
The atmosphere
Brown owls in a population have more offspring over a multi-year period than gray owls because the brown owls are better camouflaged. This is an example of what?
Natural selection
The process of converting semiarid regions to deserts:
Desertification
The use of organisms to remove pollutants from soil, air, or water is known as:
Bioremediation
In biology, what does the term “fitness” mean?
It is a measure of reproductive success; the relative likelihood of an individual contributing fertile offspring to the future generations
The earliest evidence of life comes from the fossils of which organism?
Stromatolites
Name and describe the types of speciation.
Allopatric speciation- when the parent species becomes separated into two or more populations.
Sympatric speciation- new species arise from within the geographic range of the original species.
A species whose impact on its community is much larger than its abundance or total biological mass would indicate.
Keystone species
Alternation of generations describes:
A life cycle in which an organism has both haploid and diploid stages
What is the most common gas in the atmosphere?
Nitrogen
Who disproved the theory that nonliving matter could spontaneously form living organisms?
Louis Pasteur
Explain the difference between crossing over and genetic recombination.
Crossing over is the process of exchanging segments of chromosomes between homologous chromosomes.
Genetic recombination is the process of recombining genes to produce new gene combinations that differ from those of either parent.
Behavior that reduces an individual’s fitness while increasing the fitness of others in the population is known as:
Altruism
What are lichens?
A composite organism that arises from algae or cyanobacteria living among the hyphae of fungi in a mutualistic relationship
What is the term for the rapid evolution of many diverse species from a common ancestor (Darwin’s finches)?
Adaptive radiation
What do you call water that has a higher salinity than freshwater, but a lower salinity than seawater?
Brackish
The mass extinction of almost all dinosaurs:
Cretaceous extinction
What is the largest terrestrial biome on Earth?
Northern Coniferous Forest (Taiga)
Name and give an example of the 9 major phyla in the animal kingdom:
Porifera- sponges, Cnidaria- jellyfish, Platyhelminthes- flatworms, Nematoda- roundworms, Arthropoda- insects, Mollusca- snails, Annelida- earthworms, Echinodermata- sea stars, Chordata- humans
A series of reciprocal evolutionary adaptations in two species is known as:
Coevolution
Describe what metagenomics is:
A method of collecting samples (mostly environmental) of genetic material (genomes) from a mixed community of organisms to sequence the DNA they contain. Computer software assembles the collection of genomes
Long periods of little apparent morphological change interrupted by relatively brief periods of sudden change are known as what?
Punctuated equilibrium
Give the logistic growth formula.
G = rN*((K-N)/K))
What is the oldest hominin discovered?
Sahelanthropus tchadensis
List and describe the 3 main biogeochemical cycles:
Carbon cycle- CO₂ gas exists in the atmosphere and is converted to organic molecules through photosynthesis and is passed along the food chain, and respiration cycles the organic carbon back to the atmosphere as CO₂ gas.
Phosphorus cycle- Weathering of rocks and volcanic activity releases inorganic phosphate into the soil, plants assimilate the dissolved phosphate ions and build them into organic compounds which enters the food web. The phosphate is then returned back to the soil by decomposers and dead plants and animals. Phosphate enters the oceans in surface runoff where it may settle and become new rocks.
Nitrogen cycle- atmospheric nitrogen is converted into ammonia, the ammonia picks up another hydrogen ion, and the ammonia is converted into ammonium. Nitrifying bacteria convert the ammonium into nitrate which is assimilated by plants and enters the food web. Organisms die and release the nitrogen back into the soil through decomposition. Denitrifying bacteria absorb the nitrogen from the soil and convert it to nitrogen gas. The gas is released back into the atmosphere.