Global Climate Cycling Flashcards

A set of vocabulary flashcards covering global climate cycling, the hydrological cycle, the mercury cycle, and the carbon cycle based on the introductory lecture transcript.

Elemental cycle

The pathways that elements move through as they change status and pass between the atmosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, and geosphere.

Biosphere

The sphere within earth systems inhabited by living things that experiences considerable change due to carbon and nitrogen levels.

Hydrosphere

The sphere of earth systems comprising all water environments, including terrestrial, freshwater, and marine ecosystems.

Geosphere

The solid part of the earth system through which elements move as they change status.

Fundamentals of Ecosystem Sciences

The recommended textbook for the course written by Weathers, Strayer, and Lycans.

Hydrological fluxes

The movements of water that enable the circulation of earth-atmosphere systems and empower interaction between processes.

Evaporation

The process of changing water from an aqueous phase into a gaseous phase.

Condensation

The process where water changes from a gaseous phase back into an aqueous phase.

Precipitation

One of the seven movements of water; total land precipitation is estimated at $111,000\,km^3/year$.

Sublimation

One of the seven specific movements by which water enables transfer between different pools.

Transpiration

A movement of water involving the release of water vapor from plants into the atmosphere.

Runoff

The movement of water over the land surface as a hydrological flux.

Infiltration

The process by which water on the ground surface enters the soil.

Vector

A role played by water as a carrier for the migration of elements between different pools.

International Bulk Containers (IBCs)

Containers used to carry liquid that represent $1\,m^3$ of liquid, or $1\,ton$ in the case of water.

Cubic kilometer ($km^3$)

A unit equivalent to $1 \times 10^{15}\,liters$ or $1 \times 10^{12}\,m^3$, approximately the size of $400,000,000$ Olympic sized swimming pools.

Flux

A term describing an element or substance in motion between different reservoirs.

Pool

A reservoir or location where an element is sequestered or stored.

Groundwater discharge

Water moving from the ground into rivers, estimated to be about $10\%$ of total river discharge globally.

Hydrogyrum

The former name for mercury, derived from the Greek words 'hydor' for water and 'Argyros' for silver.

Mercury ($Hg$)

Atomic number 80; a dense metallic element that is liquid at standard temperature and pressure with a molecular weight of $200.59$.

Divalent mercury ($Hg^{2+}$)

The oxidized form of mercury which is more prone to toxicity than the reduced form.

Zero valent mercury ($Hg^0$)

The reduced, elemental form of mercury.

Amalgam

A mercury-based mixture traditionally used to remove gold from complex mineral matrices.

Methyl mercury

An organo form of mercury produced in anaerobic environments with much greater potency and toxicity than elemental mercury.

Methylation

The transformation of mercury ($II$) into an organo form in anaerobic environments, a process driven by the carbon cycle.

Demethylation

The process of converting methyl mercury back into an ionic state.

Megagram ($Mg$)

A unit of mass equal to $1,000,000\,grams$ or one metric ton.

Biocide

A medical use for mercury due to its high level of toxicity.

Anthropogenic flux

The movement of elements, such as the $7,300\,Mg/year$ of new mercury releases, caused by human activity.

Carbon ($C$)

Atomic number 6; the fifteenth most abundant element in the Earth's crust, derived from the Latin word for coal ('carbo').

Allotropes

Different structural forms of the same element, such as graphite and diamonds for carbon.

Inorganic carbon

Forms of carbon like carbon dioxide ($CO_2$) that can be converted to organic forms with an input of energy.

Organic carbon

Pre-fixed carbon forms that release energy upon the breaking of organic bonds to return to an inorganic state.

Photosynthesis

The process by which photosynthetically active cells in plants and algae take $CO_2$ from the atmosphere and turn it into prefixed organic carbon.

Aerobic respiration

The process of taking prefixed carbon and producing carbon dioxide while liberating energy.

Decomposition

The process of taking organic carbon linked to water to release energy and produce carbon dioxide.

Redox reactions

Coupled reactions involving electron donation (oxidation) and electron acceptance (reduction).

Electron donation

The part of a redox reaction that creates an oxidized product.

Electron acceptance

The part of a redox reaction that creates a reduced product.

Lithosphere

The rigid outer part of the earth where carbon is buried or sequestered within mineral processes.

Petagram ($Pg$)

A unit of mass equal to $1,000,000,000\,metric\,tons$, a gigaton, or $1 \times 10^{15}\,grams$.

Carbon stocks

The reservoir mass of carbon, often measured in petagrams ($Pg$).

Sedimentary rocks

A massive carbon pool estimated to hold between $50,000,000$ and $90,000,000\,Pg$ of carbon.

Fossil fuels

A carbon reservoir holding about $10,000,000\,Pg$ of carbon.

Marine biota

Living organisms in the ocean that interact with surface ocean carbon pools at a flux of about $50\,Pg/year$.

Dissolved organic carbon (DOC)

A form of carbon stored in water that may not go through further degradation.

Particulate materials

Sinking matter through which carbon can be sequestered into water.

Biome

A large naturally occurring community of flora and fauna, such as tropical rainforests or tundra, used to estimate carbon stocks.

Tropical rainforest (carbon density)

An environment with a high carbon density of $194\,tons$ of carbon per hectare.

Tundra (carbon density)

An environment with a low carbon density of $4\,tons$ of carbon per hectare.

Carbon residence time

The turnover time for carbon in a biome; for example, $15.5\,years$ in tropical rainforests.

Industrial Revolution

The historical period starting around 1800 that caused a sudden spike in atmospheric $CO_2$ concentrations.

Interglacial periods

Times between ice ages when concentrations of $CO_2$ have historically changed between approximately $190$ and $300\,ppm$.

Parts per million (ppm)

The unit used to measure the concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide.

Calcareous rocks

Types of rocks in the lithosphere associated with the storage of approximately $50,000,000\,Pg$ of carbon.

Permafrost

A carbon pool sitting at about $1,700\,Pg$ that is in danger of being released into the atmosphere due to climate change.

Scottish Monroe

An analogy used to visualize volume, being approximately $3,000\,feet$ or $1,000\,meters$ high.

Steady state

A conceptual condition where the inputs and outputs of a particular element's cycle are balanced.

Biomass

Biological material that can pick up trace amounts of mercury and release it into the atmosphere when burned.

Long range transport

The movement of elements like mercury over great distances, often following high-altitude release from volcanic eruptions.

Anaerobic sediments

Oxygen-poor environments where mercury can react to become bound as a sulfide.

Troposphere

The lowest layer of the atmosphere, containing about $4,000\,Mg$ of mercury.

Evapotranspiration

The combined process of evaporation and plant transpiration; forestry evapotranspiration constitutes about $1,100\,Mg$ of mercury flux.

Recalcitrant carbon

Stable forms of carbon that build up in the soil over time rather than being easily degraded.

Deep ocean (carbon pool)

A large carbon reservoir containing approximately $38,000\,Pg$ of carbon.

Surface ocean (carbon pool)

An oceanic reservoir holding about $1,000\,Pg$ of carbon with an annual flux of $970\,Pg$.

Global climate cycling

The overarching study of how elements and water move through earth systems.

Multitude of isotopes

The reason why mercury has a varying molecular weight, averaged at $200.59$.

Polymers

Complex chains formed by carbon that are essential for the existence of life as we understand it.