| A | B |
|---|
| biotic factors | the living parts of an organism's habitat |
| abiotic factors | the nonliving parts of an organism's habitat. They include water, sunlight, oxygen, temperature, and soil |
| photosynthesis | A process in which water, sunlight, and carbon dioxide are combined to make food |
| producer | An organism that can make its own food |
| consumer | An organism that obtains energy by feeding on other organisms |
| herbivores | consumers that eat only plants |
| carnivores | consumers that eat only animals |
| omnivores | consumers that eat both plants and animals |
| scavenger | carnivore that feeds on the bodies of dead organisms |
| decomposers | break down wastes and dead organisms and return the raw materials to the ecosystem |
| food chain | series of events in which one organism eats another and obtains energy. |
| food web | many overlapping food chains in an ecosystem |
| energy pyramid | shows the amount of energy that moves from one feeding level to another in a food web |
| primary consumer | herbivore - eats the producers |
| secondary comsumer | carnivore - eats the primary consumers or herbivores |
| phytoplankton | microscopic green organisms in water ecosystems that make their own food by photosynthesis |
| carbon dioxide, water and sunlight | raw materials needed for photosynthesis |
| sugar and oxygen | end products of photosynthesis |
| sunlight | ultimate source of energy for all living thingsw |
| bacterial and fungus (mushrooms, molds and mildews) | major organisms that function as decomposers |
| sunlight, soil, water, and air | major examples of abiotic factors |
| Law of 10% | only 10% of the energy in one trophic level transfers to the next trophic level |
| First Law of Energy | energy cannot be created or destroyed, but it can be tranferred or transformed |
| Second Law of Energy | whenever energy is transferred or transformed, some of the useful energy must be lost as heat |
| Closed System | materials (atoms & molecules) cycle and recycle in an ecosystem |
| Open System | energy flows into an ecosystem as the sun and flows out as heat |
| tertiary | science word for "third" |
| quaternary | science word for "fourth" |
