Matter & Energy
This cellular process uses oxygen to break down glucose into usable ATP energy, releasing carbon dioxide and water as waste.
What is cellular respiration?
This term describes the living parts of an ecosystem, such as plants, animals, and bacteria, that interact with the non-living environment?
What are biotic factors?
The double-stranded, helical molecule contains the hereditary instructions used in the development, functioning, and reproduction of all living organisms.
What is DNA/
Coined by Charles Darwin, this mechanism explains how organisms with traits better suited to their environment are more likely to survive and reproduce.
What is natural selection?
The process whereby the entire ecosystem may be affected by the removal of an important component of the ecosystem such as a keystone species.
What is a trophic cascade?
These specific proteins act as biological catalysts, speeding up chemical reactions by lowering the activation energy without being consumed.
What are enzymes?
Unlike the linear flow of energy, matter such as carbon, nitrogen, and water is continuously exchanged in this type of movement within the earth systems.
What is cycling?
This cellular process involves a single cell dividing into two genetically identical daughter cells for growth and tissue repair.
What is mitosis?
Any inherited trait or characteristic that enhances an organism’s ability to survive and reproduce in a specific environment.
What is an adaptation?
The fundamental biological concept refers to the body’s ability to maintain a stable, balanced internal environment despite external changes.
What is homeostasis?
This cellular process takes place in the chloroplasts of plants and uses carbon dioxide and water in the presence of sunlight to produce glucose and oxygen.
What is photosynthesis?
This is the maximum population size of a species that a given environment can sustainably support based on its available resources.
What is carrying capacity?
These permanent changes in the nucleotide sequence of DNA are the ultimate source of genetic variation.
What are mutations?
Structural features in different species, like the flipper of a whale and the arm of a human, that share a common evolutionary origin despite different structures.
What are homologous structures?
This type of feedback loop acts to reverse or minimize a change in the body such as sweating to lower an elevated body temperature.
What is a negative feedback loop?
This represents the specific chemical or chemical formula of the primary organic product generated during photosynthesis.
What is glucose or C6H12O6?
This ecological process describes the orderly, predictable changes a disrupted ecosystem goes through as it regenerates, starting with pioneer species.
What is ecological succession?
During meiosis, this crucial process involves homologous chromosomes exchanging genetic material, resulting in unique combinations of alleles in gametes.
What is crossing-over?
Structural features with similar functions like the wings of butterflies, birds, and bats that arise by independent evolutionary pathways.
What are analogous structures?
This term in engineering design describes both the benefits and potential harm of potential solutions.
What are trade-offs?
In an ecosystem, what percent of the energy is transferred from one trophic level to the next, while the rest is lost in metabolic processes primarily as heat?
What is 10%?
Human activities like burning fossil fuels release excess carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, trapping heat and driving this global environmental crisis.
What is climate change?
This biotechnology tool allows scientists to cut, paste, and alter DNA sequences, creating transgenic organisms like insulin-producing bacteria.
What is genetic engineering?
When a geographic barrier like a river or mountain range splits a population, it prevents interbreeding and often leads to this process of forming new species.
What is speciation?
In engineering design, this term describes the strict limitations or restrictions a solution must work within, such as cost, materials, or time.
What are constraints?