Water Cycle
The movement of water between the oceans, atmosphere, land, and living things
What is the water cycle?
Molecules that contain carbon
What are organic molecules?
Carbon dioxide and water are byproducts of THIS
What is respiration?
Organisms need this to build proteins and DNA or new cells
What is Nitrogen?
A small community grows in an area where organisms had not previously lived
What is primary succession?
The change of a substance from a liquid to a gas
What is evaporation?
The exchange of carbon between the environment and living things
What is the Carbon Cycle?
The breakdown of substances into simpler molecular substances
What is decomposition?
The movement of nitrogen between the environment and living things
What is the nitrogen cycle?
The first organisms or species that colonizes an uninhabited area and starts a process of succession
What is pioneer species?
The change of state from a gas to a liquid
What is Condensation?
The basis of the carbon cycle where plants use carbon dioxide from air to make sugars.
What is photosynthesis?
The process of burning a substance such as wood or fossil fuels
What is combustion?
The percentage of the Earth's atmosphere that is nitrogen gas
What is 78%?
When an existing community is destroys by a natural disaster, like fire or flood, and the soil is left intact for the community to regrow in stages
What is secondary succession?
Any form of water that flows to the Earth's surface from the clouds
What is precipitation?
Most animals get the carbon and energy they need by doing THIS
What is eating plants?
Decomposition and combustion release THIS into the atmosphere
What is Carbon Dioxide?
Without THIS nitrogen could not enter living things or be returned to the atmosphere
What is bacteria?
As a community matures it may be dominated by well-adapted, slow growing species
What is a climax species?
THIS is limited so it is used over and over again on Earth
What is matter?
The process of sugar molecules broken down to release energy
What is respiration?
THIS may remain in the environment for millions of years before becoming available to living things
What is Carbon?
The process of bacteria in the soil changing nitrogen gas into forms that plants can use
What is nitrogen fixation?
The varieties of species that are present in an area
What is Biodiversity?