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Abiotic components include physical conditions and non-living resources that affect living organisms in terms of growth, maintenance, and reproduction. Resources are distinguished as substances or objects in the environment required by one organism and consumed or otherwise made unavailable for use by other organisms.
Biotic factors of the ecosystem are living things; such as plants, animals, and bacteria, while abiotic are non-living components; such as water, soil and atmosphere. Plants allow energy to enter the system through photosynthesis, building up plant tissue.
All living things contain two types of large molecule, proteins and nucleic acids, the latter usually both DNA and RNA: these carry the information needed by each species, including the instructions to make each type of protein. The proteins, in turn, serve as the machinery which carries out the many chemical processes of life.
The prevailing scientific hypothesis is that the transition from non-living to living entities on Earth was not a single event, but a process of increasing complexity involving the formation of a habitable planet, the prebiotic synthesis of organic molecules, molecular self-replication, self-assembly, autocatalysis, and the emergence of cell ...
Eugene Odum, one of the founders of the science of ecology, stated: "Any unit that includes all of the organisms (i.e.: the "community") in a given area interacting with the physical environment so that a flow of energy leads to clearly defined trophic structure, biotic diversity, and material cycles (i.e.: exchange of materials between living ...
Ecosystem services are ecologically mediated functional processes essential to sustaining healthy human societies. [6] Water provision and filtration, production of biomass in forestry, agriculture, and fisheries, and removal of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide (CO 2) from the atmosphere are examples of ecosystem services essential to public health and economic opportunity.
Biotic: Resources that originate from the biosphere and have life such as flora and fauna, fisheries, livestock, etc. Fossil fuels such as coal and petroleum are also included in this category because they are formed from decayed organic matter. Abiotic: Resources that originate from non-living and inorganic material.
Aquatic plants live in both the benthic and pelagic zones, and can be grouped according to their manner of growth: ⑴ emergent = rooted in the substrate, but with leaves and flowers extending into the air; ⑵ floating-leaved = rooted in the substrate, but with floating leaves; ⑶ submersed = growing beneath the surface; ⑷ free-floating ...