Ecosystems
This type of ecosystem includes forests, grasslands, and deserts, while its counterpart includes oceans, lakes, and rivers.
What is a terrestrial ecosystem?
These organisms form the base of the food chain by converting sunlight into energy through photosynthesis.
What are producers?
This process, performed by plants, removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and converts it into glucose.
What is photosynthesis?
This biome is home to the most biodiversity on Earth and has warm temperatures and high rainfall year-round.
What is the tropical rainforest?
This type of symbiotic relationship benefits one organism while the other is harmed.
What is parasitism?
The specific environment where an organism lives, providing food, water, and shelter, is called this.
What is a habitat?
This rule states that only about this percentage of energy is passed from one trophic level to the next in an ecosystem.
What is the 10% rule?
The burning of fossil fuels releases this gas into the atmosphere, contributing to climate change.
What is carbon dioxide (CO₂)?
This biome is characterized by permafrost, low temperatures, and small, hardy plants like mosses and lichens.
What is the tundra?
In this type of competition, two species fight for the same limited resource, which can affect their survival.
What is interspecific competition?
A species' role in its environment, including its interactions with other organisms and its use of resources, is known by this ecological term.
What is a niche?
A lion that eats herbivores like zebras is classified as this type of consumer.
What is a secondary consumer?
This process occurs when dead organisms break down, returning carbon to the soil and atmosphere.
What is decomposition?
Found in Africa, this biome has warm temperatures, seasonal rainfall, and is home to animals like lions, zebras, and elephants.
What is the savanna?
In this type of symbiotic relationship, both organisms benefit from the interaction.
What is mutualism?
In aquatic ecosystems, this zone receives enough sunlight for photosynthesis, while its deeper counterpart remains in darkness.
What is the photic zone?
These organisms, including fungi and bacteria, break down dead material and recycle nutrients back into the ecosystem.
What are decomposers?
This step of the water cycle occurs when liquid water turns into water vapor.
What is evaporation?
This biome is dominated by coniferous trees, has cold winters, and is also known as the boreal forest.
What is the taiga?
The lion hunting and killing a zebra is an example of this ecological interaction.
What is predation?
In the aphotic zone, many organisms survive without sunlight by relying on hydrothermal vents in a process called this.
What is chemosynthesis?
These organisms, including earthworms and millipedes, consume dead organic matter and help break it down into smaller particles.
What are detritivores?
Water moves through plants from the roots to the leaves, where it evaporates into the atmosphere in this process.
What is transpiration?
This aquatic biome is the largest of all, covering about 70% of the Earth's surface.
What is the ocean?
This type of symbiotic relationship occurs when one organism benefits, and the other is neither helped nor harmed.
What is commensalism?