ENVS195 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Phosphorus Cycle, Phosphate, Acid Rain
11 Dec 2019
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Document Summary
Natural conditions: movement between components balanced over time. Human activities: speed up transference between cycle components. Results in: accumulation in one or more components of a cycle. Phosphorus macronutrient essential for life, found in dna and rna. Plants: developing healthy seeds, root growth, and stem strength. Animals (humans): developing healthy bones (works with ca to build bone tissue) Unlike carbon, phosphorus is not stored as a gas in the atmosphere. Phosphorus is stored in rock and sediments on the ocean floors (lithosphere) Phosphorus is released from rock into the soil by a process called weathering . Weathering = rock breaks down into smaller pieces. These pieces make their way into the soil. Plants take up phosphate through their roots (inorganic phosphate) Animals eat the plants (get phosphate) (organic phosphate through the food chain) Decomposers return it to the soil (inorganic phosphate) found sometimes in waste products as well. Phosphorus cycle weathering aquatic (water bodies)
