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12 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
What are producers? |
- photosynthetic organisms - make organic substances with light energy, water, CO2 and minerals |
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What are consumers? |
- get energy eating other organisms (use sunlight indirectly) |
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What are primary and secondary consumers? |
Primary: directly eat producers;first in consumer chain Secondary: eat primary consumers |
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What are saprobionts? |
- break down dead organism material - release valuable minerals=absorbed by plants - e.g. bacteria/fungi |
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What is a food chain? |
- feeding relationship where producers are eaten by primary consumers etc. - each stage=trophic level - arrows=energy flow |
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What is a food chain? |
- many linked food chains - complex |
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What is biomass? |
- the total mass of living material in a specific area at a certain time |
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What are the issues with using fresh mass to measure biomass? |
- easy to access - varying amounts of water=unreliable |
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What are the issues with using dry mass to measure biomass? |
- no water content - organism killed=small sample=unrepresentative |
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What are the different units for measuring biomass? |
- grams per square metre (gm-2) for area [glassland] - grams per cubic metre (gm-3) for volume [ocean] |
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What is calorimetry? |
- a way to measure the chemical energy store in a biomass |
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How do you conduct a bomb calorimetry? |
- sample of dry mass weighed/burnt in pure O2 in sealed chamber [bomb] - bomb surrounded by water bath - combustion=water temp up - know specific heat capacity of water - know volume of water/temp rise=calculate energy released from burnt biomass - unit=kJg-1 |