Biology Lecture Review - Carbon Cycle, Botany, Evolution, and Neurobiology

A comprehensive set of vocabulary flashcards based on lecture notes covering the carbon cycle, plant diversity, photosynthetic adaptations, evolutionary mechanisms, and cellular neurobiology.

Photosynthesis

A process that moves carbon from a reservoir to another, taking $CO_2$ as input and producing glucose as output.

Respiration

A metabolic process involving the input of glucose and the output of $CO_2$.

Consumption

A process where an organism takes in food containing carbon, resulting in carbon dioxide being exhaled and the remainder becoming the biomass of the organism.

Decomposition

A process where carbon in an organism is broken down, producing $CO_2$ in aerobic conditions and both $CO_2$ and $CH_4$ in anaerobic conditions.

Combustion

The burning of carbon-containing materials like oil, resulting in $CO_2$ from efficient combustion and $CH_4$ from incomplete combustion.

Biomineralization

A process where organisms like corals, clams, and mussels take carbonate ions to form calcium carbonate structures like shells.

Basidiomycota (Fungi)

A eukaryotic kingdom characterized by cell walls made of chitin and structures such as hyphae, mycelium, and fruiting bodies.

Hyphae

A single, long filament that serves as the building block of a fungus.

Mycelium

The vegetative, non-reproductive part of a fungus made of many branching hyphae, often found underground.

Anthropogenic

Originating from human sources or activities.

Greenhouse effect

The process where incoming solar radiation reflects off the Earth's surface and heat is trapped by gases in the atmosphere, causing temperatures to rise.

Ocean acidification

A decrease in ocean $pH$ caused by increased $CO_2$ levels, leading to more $H^+$ ions and the formation of bicarbonate instead of carbonate.

Phenotypic plasticity

The ability of one genotype to produce more than one phenotype when exposed to different environments.

Temperature Sex Determination (TSD)

A process where the temperature of the embryo's environment determines its biological sex, common in reptiles like turtles and crocodiles.

Bryophytes

Non-vascular plants such as mosses, liverworts, and hornworts that lack true leaves, stems, and roots and reproduce by spores.

Gymnosperms

Vascular plants like pines and firs that reproduce by seeds typically developed on the scales of cones and utilize wind pollination.

Angiosperms

Flowering plants where seeds develop within an enclosed chamber called a fruit; the most diverse plant phylum.

Pollination

The transfer of pollen grains from the anther to the stigma in angiosperms, or from male to female cones in gymnosperms.

Fertilization

The fusion of a male haploid gamete with a female haploid gamete to form a diploid zygote.

Stomata

Pores on the underside of leaves guarded by two cells that open and close to regulate gas exchange and water loss.

Xylem

Plant vascular tissue consisting of tubes for moving water and minerals throughout the plant.

Phloem

Plant vascular tissue that moves sugars, organic molecules, and hormones from sources to sinks.

Rubisco

The key enzyme in photosynthesis that attaches $CO_2$ to ribulose biphosphate, a $5-C$ sugar.

Photorespiration

A wasteful process where Rubisco binds with oxygen instead of $CO_2$, increasing at higher temperatures.

C4 Photosynthesis

A photosynthetic pathway that concentrates $CO_2$ around Rubisco by first making a $4-carbon$ sugar in mesophyll cells to avoid photorespiration.

CAM (Crassulacean Acid Metabolism)

An adaptation to dry conditions where plants open stomata at night to store carbon as an organic acid and close them during the day.

Evolution

Changes in the heritable traits of a population over generations.

Allele

Different versions or variants of the same gene with different nucleotide sequences.

Genetic drift

A change in the gene pool or allele frequencies in a population due to random chance, having the largest effect on small populations.

Bottleneck effect

A type of genetic drift where a natural disaster un-selectively kills many individuals, resulting in a remaining population with reduced genetic diversity.

Founder effect

Genetic drift that occurs when a few individuals colonize an isolated habitat, resulting in a gene pool different from the original population.

Natural selection

The differential survival and reproduction of individuals due to differences in phenotype.

Fitness

A measure of reproductive success and the contribution of an individual to the next generation's gene pool.

Adaptation

A heritable trait evolved through natural selection that maintains or increases the fitness of an organism in a specific environment.

Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium

A null hypothesis state where no evolution occurs because there is no selection, no mutation, no migration, a large population, and random mating.

Fixation

When an allele's frequency reaches $100\%$ in a population, and all other alleles for that gene are lost.

Inbreeding depression

Reduced fitness in offspring resulting from the mating of closely related individuals who are homozygous recessive for harmful alleles.

Biological Species Concept (BSC)

The definition of species as groups of actually or potentially inbreeding populations that are reproductively isolated from other such groups.

Monophyletic group

A taxonomic group containing an ancestor and all of its descendants.

Homologous traits

Similar traits in different organisms inherited from a common ancestor.

Analogous traits

Traits that are shared in two or more taxa because they serve a similar function but evolved separately due to convergent evolution.

Anisogamy

A condition where a species produces gametes of different sizes, such as small sperm and large eggs.

Haplodiploidy

A sex determination system where females are diploid (from fertilized eggs) and males are haploid (from unfertilized eggs).

Hermaphroditism

When an individual organism produces both male and female gametes during its lifetime.

Homeostasis

The active regulation of a stable internal environment within an organism.

Neuron

The basic unit of the nervous system consisting of a cell body, dendrites for receiving signals, and an axon for transmitting electrical signals.

Action potential

A rapid rise and fall in membrane potential that travels along an axon to transmit information.

Sodium-potassium pump

A protein using active transport to move $3\,Na^+$ ions out of the cell and $2\,K^+$ ions into the cell to maintain electrochemical gradients.