Shaking Things Up
This kind of fossil evidence, where the same plant or animal is found on different continents, supports the idea that continents were once connected.
What are fossils?
A watershed is an area of land where all the water drains to the same place. This is the name for water that flows over the surface, like rivers and lakes.
What is surface water?
This type of organism is at the base of every energy pyramid and provides energy for all other organisms in an ecosystem.
What is a producer (or autotroph)?
This system transports oxygen and nutrients throughout the body and removes carbon dioxide.
What is the circulatory system?
In this type of reproduction, offspring are genetically identical to the parent because there is only one parent involved.
What is asexual reproduction?
According to this theory, Earth’s crust is broken into large pieces that slowly move over time.
What is plate tectonics?
Dumping waste or using too many chemicals on farms can harm this underground water source.
What is groundwater?
In an energy pyramid, as you move from one trophic level to the next, this happens to the amount of available energy.
What is it decreases (or gets smaller)?
This system helps you breathe by allowing oxygen to enter the body and carbon dioxide to be expelled.
What is the respiratory system?
This type of reproduction involves two parents and leads to offspring with genetic diversity.
What is sexual reproduction?
When two tectonic plates collide, this tall landform can be created—like the Himalayas.
What are mountains?
Humans depend on ocean systems for many things—name one.
What is food / transportation / oxygen / climate regulation?
This diagram shows the decrease in energy as you move from one trophic level to the next, with the highest amount of energy at the base.
What is an energy pyramid?
The brain and spinal cord make up this system, which controls body movements and processes sensory information.
What is the nervous system?
This process occurs when a trait becomes more common in a population over time due to the survival and reproduction of organisms with that trait.
What is natural selection?
These events happen when stress builds up along faults between transform plates and is suddenly released.
What are earthquakes?
Fertilizer runoff can cause this harmful process in oceans and lakes, where algae grow too fast and lower oxygen levels.
What is an algal bloom?
The recycling of this substance in ecosystems ensures that nutrients like carbon and nitrogen are reused over and over again.
What is matter (or nutrients)?
This system is responsible for breaking down food, absorbing nutrients, and eliminating waste.
What is the digestive system?
Farmers often breed animals with desirable traits like size or speed. This is an example of this kind of selection.
What is artificial selection?
This type of volcanic feature forms over a stationary plume of hot magma, even in the middle of a tectonic plate—Hawai’i is an example.
What is a hot spot?
This term describes a human-caused problem when oil spills, plastic, or chemicals end up in oceans and hurt marine life.
What is Ocean Pollution?
This process, where decomposers break down dead organisms, releases nutrients back into the soil, supporting new growth.
What is decomposition?
This system defends the body against harmful pathogens like bacteria and viruses, using cells like white blood cells.
What is the immune system?
In a population of beetles, the darker beetles are better camouflaged from predators. Over time, the population contains more dark beetles. This is an example of this process.
What is natural selection?