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91 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
continentality |
seasonal variability in climate |
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biosphere subcycle |
terrestrial & marine realms, inorganic & organic pathways; fast cycling |
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lithosphere subcycle |
long term storage and tectonic re-cycling; slow cycling |
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nutrients |
substances essential to life |
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biosphere |
the part of the earth that supports life; including the oceans, atmosphere, land surface and soils |
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organic carbon |
associated with compounds of biologic systems (C-C & C-H bonds) |
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inorganic carbon |
associated with compounds of inorganic systems |
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steady state |
no change in state of the system with time |
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reservoirs |
temporary repositories for mass that flows through them; size depends on imbalances between inflow and outflow |
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residence time |
average time that an element remains in a reservoir at steady state |
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oxidation |
a loss of electrons and a gain in valance |
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cyanobacteria |
earths earliest photosynthesizer; blue-green algae (3.5 Ga) |
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stromatolites |
columnar/conical shaped sedimentary structures with laminations; formed by colonies of cyanobacteria |
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branded iron formations (BIF's) |
laminated chemical precipitate of ancient seawater, formed in epicontinental settings when seas were high or rifted basins; alternating layers of Fe & Si rich |
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red beds |
reddish coloured sandstones deposited in continental riverine environments; red colour derives from FeO3 (rust) |
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isotopes |
have same proton number but different neutron numbers and different masses; serve as fingerprint for the processes that may have acted on those materials |
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autotrophs |
aka primary producers; organisms that grow by using a source of energy to reduced CO2 |
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trophosome |
highly vascularized organ in giant tube worms; contain special cells parked full of chemoautotrophic sulphur bacteria |
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heterotrophs |
grow by using organic matter produced by other organisms; secondary producers |
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species |
closely related organisms that can potentially interbreed and produce fertile offspring |
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population |
all members of a single species that live in a given area |
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community |
assemblage of two or more groups of interacting species (plants, animals, fungi, etc.) |
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biome |
region with a characteristic plant community |
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ecosystem |
a community of plants, animals, fungi and microbes couple with the environment (coral reef, boreal forest, arctic, desert, etc.) |
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ecotone |
diffuse boundary between ecosystems; contains an assemblage of species not found in either adjacent ecosystems |
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cryovegetation |
microscopic algae that grow in polar regions |
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food chain |
charts which organisms feed on which |
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food web |
interconnected food chains that can be ordered at trophic levels |
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biomass |
the total combined weight of organic material in each trophic level; decreases by 90-99% for each level |
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symbiosis |
a relationship where two 2 species benefit from living together |
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niche |
describes an animals lifestyle |
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succession |
disturbance of an ecosystem generates a predictable sequence of responses |
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biodiversity |
the number of species in a given area |
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simpsons diversity index |
measures the likelihood that 2 individuals drawn from the same community will be of different species |
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time stability hypothesis |
environment stability like that seen in the tropics leads to high diversity |
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An Gorta Mor |
implications for low diversity |
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monocultures |
famine, disease and social breakdown |
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evolution |
the descent with modification (through genetic mutation) of pre existing life forms |
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natural selection |
unequal survival & reproduction of organisms; preservation of favourable traits |
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adaptations |
characteristics that enhance an organisms survival/ reproductive success |
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logistic growth |
population increases rapidly when numbers are low and birth rate decreases, death rate increases until birthrate equals carrying capacity |
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taxonomy |
systematic organization of living or fossil organisms into a hierarchy |
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cambrian explosion |
most remarkable burst of evolution; all phyla evolved |
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mass extinction |
when 25% or more families disappear |
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crurotarsi |
(cross ankles) group of archosaurs; crocodiles evolved from these |
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conodonts |
appear and disappear all at the same time making it easy to tell what time period it is |
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stromatoporids |
similar to stromatolites, made of layers of algae |
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hernantian stage |
cold terminal end of the ordovician |
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iridium anomaly |
rare metal found only in meteorites and deep down in the earth; found in 75 locations world wide |
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deccan basalts |
gases released changed climate; played a role in the extinction of dinosaurs |
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comets |
icy balls of water, ammonia, methane, CO2, rocks and metals |
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oort cloud |
spherical reservoir of comets that extend more than one light year from the sun; may be disturbed by passing stars |
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asteroids |
composed of minerals and metals; orbit between Mars & Jupiter |
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sideophile |
"iron loving" elements like iridium are concentrated on the interiors of planets and asteroids; (evidence for the K-T extinction) |
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otolith |
ear stones in fish; used for dating temperature in the past |
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milankovich forcing |
periodic fluctuations in the earths orbital parameters causing ice sheet oscillations |
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fourier transform analysis |
affects how the sun hits the earth at any given time
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ice albedo (+) feedback |
ice sheet growth causes albedo to increase and planetary temperatures to decrease therefore encouraging more ice sheet growth |
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photolysis |
occurs high in stratosphere; organic haze that absorbs radiation and re-emits the infrared radiation to space (cools earths surface) |
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dropstone |
a rock that has fallen off of a glacier and into mud; best evidence for glaciation |
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cosmology |
oldest science we know of; observations of objects in the sky and their behaviour |
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red shift |
waves coming at you; high frequency
|
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blue shift |
waves away from you; low frequency |
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planickian |
first period of cosmic time; defined by the time it took light to travel the plank length (1.616x10^-35m) |
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gamowian |
ranges from 5.390x10^-44 s and 4.6 billion yrs; longest aeon in cosmic time; universe has been expanding the whole time |
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open universe |
universe that will keep expanding forever; increasing or constant rate |
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flat universe |
finite radius; decreasing rates decrease to 0 and reverse itself collapsing in a cosmocrunch |
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expansion |
continuous creation of space between objects that are not gravitationally bound; space between galactic clusters |
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weak force |
stabilizes neutrons |
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strong force |
keeps particles together |
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visible universe |
what we can see with the hubble telescope |
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microwave radiation |
temperature going to be the same no matter where you look, equal distribution of energy and matter throughout our universe |
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monopoles |
massive particles consisting of only N or S poles; should have formed in great numbers but not seen today |
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black hole |
collapsed star; very dense circle of matter |
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Titus-Bode law |
planetary distances from central body are not random; a planet like earth is likely to exist in all planetary systems (0.8x10^21) |
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fluctuating stars |
red giant phase when our sun puffs up and engulfs mars, plasma will destroy earth (in about 5 billion years) |
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white dwarves |
starts that lose half their mass to space and collapse into carbon cored stars the size of the earth |
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supernova explosion |
catastrophic collapse of a massive layered star; materials "crunching" down, creating heat and expanding |
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planetismals |
1 km toxic mud balls made of water, methane, and ammonia |
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proteins |
composed of one or more chains of amino acids (transport molecules, enzymes, and hormones) |
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climate*** |
an assemblage of weather statistics/ conditions experienced at a location over some reference time frame (usually 30 years) |
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holocene |
whole life; most things we observe today have been around for thousands of years (interval of time since the last glaciation) |
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stochastic resonance |
flipper and switch of climate |
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uniformitarianism |
the principle that processes operating today also operated in the past; present is the key to the past |
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proxy data |
data that cannot be obtained by direct measurement but can be inferred from other evidence ex) oxygen isotope data for temperature |
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palynology |
the study of pollen and organic micro-fossils; materials recovered from lakes and bogs |
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dendrochronology |
dating by counting tree rings |
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dendroclimatology |
obtaining climate info from isotope values of annual growth rings |
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bosporus |
rim of land between the black sea and mediterranean sea |
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positive NAO index |
cause for wet winters in Europe and cold, dry winters in Canada & Greenland; shows strong subtropical high pressure center |
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negative NAO index
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shows weak subtropical high pressure centre and weak Icelandic low; opposite of (+) NAO |