SCI 11: Module 2 Living Systems from Biological Perspective

• Emergent Properties: living systems are organized into hierarchies with progressive specialization of functions and complexity emerging from lower level to higher levels of organization.
• The biological level of organization - the organization system that scientists use to organize living objects from the smallest parts to the largest parts.
• Atoms - fundamental units of all substances, living or not.
• Atoms join other atoms to form molecules.
• In today's natural world, only living things make the "molecules of life," which are lipids, proteins, DNA, RNA, and complex carbohydrates.
• Organelles - membrane-enclosed structure that perform specific functions to form the cells.
• Cell - basic unit of life.
• Some cells live and reproduce independently, while other specific types are organized as tissues.
• Organ: organized array of tissues carrying our specific tasks.
• The set of interacting organs (organ system) make up the organism.
• Organism - an individual that consists of one (unicellular) or more cells (multicellular)
• Population - groups of interbreeding individuals of the same type or species living in a given area.
• Community - all populations occupying a given area.
• The community and the non-living environment function together as an ecological system or ecosystem.
• Biosphere / Ecosphere - most inclusive level encompassing all regions of Earth's crust, waters, and atmosphere in which organisms live.
• There are seven basic functions or transcending factors that operate at all levels of the ecological hierarchy.
• Energetics - study involving energy and matter conversion.


  Living systems need specific types of matter-energy in edequate amounts to keep it stable.
• Behavior and Development - can be inferred at each level of organization.
• Development at the level of the ecosystem is known as ecosystem development or succession.
• Succession - often predictable way or pattern by which plant and animal communities develop following disturbances.
• Evolution plays an important role in bringing about diversity.
• The intricate processes of integration and regulation bring separate components or subsystems into a unified and stable unit.
• Living systems are open systems with purposes and goals.
• Photosynthesis - a sun-driven process acted upon by the plants generates net increases in material quality on Earth almost entirely.
• Plants convert energy from sunlight (input ) to chemical energy (stored in food molecules such as sugars, which is used by plants to do work.
• Energy is transferred to the higher trophic levels (consumers) and is eventually lost from the ecosystem as heat (output).
• The living system forms a "feedback mechanism," with the purpose or goal of keeping this cycle in control.
• Negative feedback - An increase in the population of grazers will exert an increase in grazing pressures on plants; this will lead to a decrease in the quality and quantity of the plants which eventually causes starvation and a decrease in the population of grazers to alleviate the grazing pressure.
• Positive Feedback - happens when humans depart from this natural cycle grazing becomes unregulated because the humans who own these grazers get a reward or profit by increasing the number of grazers that they raise and sell.
• Tragedy of Commons - an economic theory related to sustainability


  The grazing pressure continues until all the plants are used up and there is no more food available for the grazers.
• Commons - taken to mean any shared and regulated resource such as water, fish stocks, trees, and so on.