What is Ecology?

• Ecology comes from the Greek

words
 oikos, meaning “house” or “place to
live”
 logos, meaning “study of”

• It is the study of the relationship

between living organisms and
their physical environment.
 What is Ecology?
• It seeks to understand the vital connections between plants and
animals and the world around them.
• It provides information about
the benefits of ecosystem and
how we can use Earth’s
resources in ways that leave
the environment healthy for
future generations.

• Ecology is the study of

connections in nature.
 How to Study Connections in Nature

Biosphere
• To better understand nature, scientists
Ecosystem
classify matter into levels of organization
from atoms to the biosphere.
Increase in complexity

Community

Population

Organism

Cell

Molecule

Atom
 Levels of Ecological Organization

Biosphere - Parts of the Earth where life is found.

Ecosystem - A community of different species interacting with one another and
with their nonliving environment of matter and energy.
Community - Populations of different species living in a particular place, and
Increase in complexity

potentially interacting with each other.

Population - A group of individuals of the same species living in a particular
place.
Organism - An individual living being.
Cell - The fundamental structural and functional unit of life.

Molecule - Chemical combination of two or more atoms of the same or different

elements.

Atom - The smallest unit of a chemical element that exhibits its chemical properties.
How to Study Connections in Nature

Biosphere
Ecologists focus on organisms,
populations, communities,
Ecosystem ecosystems, and the biosphere.

Community
Ecological levels of
organization
Population

Organism
 Population

A population is a group of individuals of the same species that live in the same
place at the same time.

Examples: A school of glassfish in the Red Sea and people in a country.

 Population

• In most natural populations, individuals vary

slightly in their genetic makeup, which is
why they do not all look or act alike. This
variation in a population is called genetic
diversity.
Mutations, Meiosis and Fertilization

• The place where a population or an individual

organism normally lives is its habitat.
• Each habitat has certain resources and
environmental conditions that its organisms need
in order to survive.
 Leisure Reading Assignment

What Is Genetic Diversity and Why Does it Matter?

• https://kids.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frym.2021.656168
Why is genetic diversity important?
How Do We Stop Genetic Diversity Loss?
• The place where an
animal or plant lives
and grows is called its
habitat.

• A habitat is where an
animal finds the food,
water, and shelter it needs
to live.

For Thursday, Feb. 23@ 2:30

 Community

A community, or biological community consists of all the

populations of different species that live in a particular place.

Example: A perch species in a pond usually share the pond with other fish
species, and with water lily, insects, frogs, and many other species that make up
the community.
 Ecosystem

• An ecosystem is a community of
different species interacting with
one another and with their
nonliving environment.

• It can range in size (from a

puddle of water to an ocean, or
from a patch of wood to a forest).

• Ecosystems can be natural or

artificial (human-made).
 Ecosystem

Ecosystems do not have

clear boundaries and are
not isolated from one
another.
Many ecosystems are defined
based on their predominant
species (e.g., forested ecosystem)
or physical characteristics (e.g.,
lake ecosystem).
 tropical coral reef Ecosystem
The tropical coral reef in seawater
with salinity of 33 ppt (represents
33 parts sodium chloride per
thousand parts water) and average
temp of 25-30 0C populated by the
organisms such as algae, corals,
worms, sea stars, fishes…
Corals are the biotic
components that
create the reefs. A reef is a non-living structure that acts as
the anchor for these tiny invertebrates.
 Biosphere

• The biosphere is
where life can be found.

• In effect, it is the global

ecosystem in which all
organisms exist and can
interact with one another.
 What Keeps Us and Other Organisms Alive?

The Earth’s life-support system has four major components that

interact with one another—the atmosphere (air), the hydrosphere
(water), the geosphere (rock, soil, sediment), and the biosphere
(living things).
 Major Components of Earth’s Life
Support System

These components are interacting with each other to form the environment.
 1 Atmosphere
Atmosphere – is a thin spherical envelope of
gases surrounding the earth’s surface.

Layers of the Atmosphere:

• Troposphere – is the inner layer that contains

the majority of the air that we breathe (78%
nitrogen, 21% oxygen, and 1% water vapor,
carbon dioxide, and methane – greenhouse
gases because they trap heat and thus warm
the lower atmosphere).
 1 Atmosphere

• Almost all of the earth’s weather occurs

in this layer.

We know weather happens in the

atmosphere, but without the hydrosphere,
there would be no water to evaporate and
so no cloud or rain could form.
 1 Atmosphere

Layers of the Atmosphere:

• Stratosphere – its lower portion contains

enough ozone (O3) gas to filter out most
of the sun’s harmful ultraviolet radiation.

• This global sunscreen allows life to exist

on land and in the surface layers of bodies of
water.