BIOL 3060 Final: SUMMARY OF LECTURES 32-33 BIOL 3060
3 Nov 2015
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
Cycling of energy and materials within ecosystems (and in and out of an ecosystem: involves biology, has geochemical consequences. Biota mediate the cycles of many elements that cycle between various reservoirs with different residence times. Biology - transfer energy through food chains/webs. Geochemistry - lead to steady state systems far from chemical equilibrium. Fundamental aspects of life, thermodynamics, etc. are the main principles of ecosystem ecology. You cannot isolate biology and geochemistry from each other. We can see evolution of geochemistry through looking at sediments (marine sediments, permafrost), these paleo records about past life and past geochemistry. Capable of transforming energy: photosynthesis and respiration. Life and the second law of thermodynamics: transformation of energy leads to disorder, life requires the maintenance of order, homeostasis, growth and reproduction occur at the expense of increased disorder (entropy) of the whole system. Life is characterized by: cells, common metabolic pathways, common genetic code.
