Ch.50+Ecology,+foundations

Chapter fifty focuses on ecology, the study of interactions between organisms and their environment. When broken down into two parts, ecology can relate to individual organisms or ecosystems and landscapes. Ecologists not only exam where organism live, why they live there and how many are present, but also study how the organisms behave and adapt to habitats. Ecology also emphasizes on abiotic and biotic components in a habitat. Biotic components include competition, disease and parasites, while abiotic factors are temperature, water, sunlight and wind. Different regions have different climates, and the curve of the earth changes the intensity of many abiotic factors, especially sunlight and global precipitation patterns. Both abiotic and biotic factors affect aquatic biomes such as lakes, wetlands, stream/rivers, estuaries, intertidal zones, oceanic pelagic biome, coral reefs and marine benthic zones. Abiotic factors play a key role in biome location therefore, climate determines the distribution and structure of biomes.

Many themes of biology are present in chapter 50. Natural selection is present in ecology because of the abiotic factors and distribution of an environment that affect the species. Evolution is also present in ecology because ecology is related to how a species becomes stable in its environment. A third and main theme of biology would be interdependence in nature, all the biotic and abiotic factors in a habitat are linked, and a change in them would effect the surrounding environment.

http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/exhibits/biomes/index.php This was a really good site for exploration of all biomes. It also had more extended information on preserving and conserving our earth's biomes. This website was very a very reliable source.

http://ecology.com/ecology-today/2008/08/01/the-vanishing-of-the-polar-ice-cap/ This was a sweet link to an ecology article from ecology.com about melting polar ice caps. It was interesting to learn about a specific biome such as the Arctic, and how rapid it is changing.