Types and specialized branches of Ecology

• Autecology, it involves the study of an individual animal or plant throughout its life in relation to the habitat factors. For autecological studies one must have the knowledge of nutrition, growth, reproduction and development of that individual.
• Synecology, it involves the study of the composition and behaviour of plant communities and their relationship to the environment. Synecology is often further subdivided into aquatic and terrestrial ecology.
• Habitat ecology, it deals with ecological study of different habitats on planet earth and their effects on the organisms living there. According to the kind of habitat, ecology is subdivided into marine ecology (oceanography), estuarine ecology, fresh water ecology (limnology), and terrestrial ecology. The terrestrial ecology in turn is classified into forest ecology, cropland ecology, grassland ecology, desert ecology, etc., according to the kinds of study of its different  habitats.
• Community ecology, it deals with the study of the local distribution of animals in various habitats, the

  recognition and composition of community units and succession.
• Population ecology, it deals with the study of the manner of growth, structure and regulation of population

  of organisms.
• Evolutionary ecology, it deals with the problems of niche segregation and speciation.
• Taxonomic ecology, it is concerned with the ecology of different taxonomic groups of living organisms and eventually includes following divisions of ecology: microbial ecology, mammalian

  ecology, avian ecology, insect ecology,  parasitological, and human ecology.
• Human ecology, it involves population ecology or man and man‟s relation to the environment,

  especially man‟s effects on the biosphere and the implication of these effects for man.
• Applied ecology, it deals with the application of ecological concepts to human needs and thus, it

  includes following applications of ecology: wild-life management, range management,

  forestry, conservation, insect control, epidemiology, animal husbandry, aquacultare, agriculture, horticulture, and land use and pollution ecology.
• Ecosystem dynamics, it deals with the ecological study of the processes of soil formation, nutrient cycling

  energy flow, and  productivity.
• Production ecology, it deals with the gross and net production of different ecosystems like fresh water, sea water, agriculture, and horticulture, and tries to do proper management of these ecosystems

  so that maximum yield can be get from them.
• Ecological energetic,

  it deals with energy conservation and its flow in the organisms within the ecosystem. The law of thermodynamics has its significant contribution.
• Physiological ecology (ecophysiology)The factors of environment have a direct bearing on the functional aspects of organisms. The  ecophysiology deals with the survival of populations as a result of functional adjustments of organisms with different ecological conditions.
• Chemical ecology, it concerns with the adaptations of animals of preferences of particular organisms like insects to particular chemical substances.

  Chemical ecology, it concerns with the adaptations of animals of preferences of particular organisms like insects to particular chemical substances.
• Ecological genetics (genecology) An ecologist recognized kind of genetic spasticity in the case of every organism. In any environment only those organisms that are favored by the environment can survive. Thus, genecology deals with the study of variations of species based upon their genetic

  potentialities.
• Palaeoecology, it is the study of  environmental conditions, and life of the past ages, to which palynology, palaeontology, and radioactive dating methods have made significant contribution.
• Geographic-ecology (ecogeography), it concentrates on the study of geographical distribution of animals (zoogeography)

  and plants (phytogeography), and also of palaeoecology and biomes.
• Space ecology, it is a modern subdivision of ecology which is concerned with the development of

  partially or completely regenerating ecosystems for supporting life of man during long space flights or during extended exploration of extra-terrestrial environments.
• Pedology, it is a branch of terrestrial ecology and it deals with the study of soils, in particular their acidity, alkalinity, humus contents, mineral contents, soil-types, and their influence on

  the organisms.
• Radiation ecology, it deals with the study of gross effects of radiations and radioactive substances over the environment and living organisms.
• Ethology, it is the interpretation of animal behaviour under natural conditions. In it, often,

  detailed life history studies of particular species are amassed.
• Sociology, it is the study of ecology and ethology of mankind.
• Systems ecology, it is the modern branch of ecology which is particularly concerned with the analysis

  and understanding of the function and structure of ecosystem by the use of applied mathematics, such as advanced statistical techniques, mathematical models, and characteristics of computer sciences.