Carbon and Nitrogen Cycles Review

Vocabulary flashcards covering the short-term and long-term carbon cycles, ammonification, and nitrogen fixation based on the study notes.

Short-term Carbon

Carbon that cycles rapidly through living things, the atmosphere, and upper oceans over days to decades via photosynthesis, respiration, and decay.

Long-term Carbon

Carbon that moves through geological reservoirs like rocks, sediments, and fossil fuels over millions of years.

Ammonification

The process where decomposers break down organic matter when plants and animals die or release waste, returning nitrogen to soil as ammonium ($NH_4^+$).

Nitrogen Fixation

The process where specialized bacteria in soil and root nodules capture atmospheric nitrogen gas ($N_2$) and convert it into ammonium ($NH_4^+$).

Nitrification

soil bacteria convert ammonium in each four into nitrates NO3, which can be used by plants

assimilation

plants absorb nitrates from the soil through their roots to build proteins animals then get nitrogen by eating plants or other animals that ingested A animal that ate a plant

why is N2 unusable?

it is unusable to most things because the two nitrogen atoms and bond together by an extremely strong triple bond making it hard for organisms to break it apart

two ways nitrogen can get soil in and how it comes back out

biological fixation, which is when soil and root nodule bacteria convert air into ammonia and atmospheric fixation, which is when lightning breaks down gas bonds into nitrate that fall in rain

how is nitrogen fixed other way it can be

can be fixed through biological fixation by soil and bacteria, atmospheric fixation via lightning and industrial fixation through chemical manufacturing