Course review
Review each learning objective in this topic, then open its concept explanation or question set.
Learning objective
• Habitat is the place where an organism, population, species, or community lives • Habitat descriptions can include geographic location, physical position, and ecosystem type • Microhabitats are small areas with conditions different from the surrounding habitat
Start with the concept explanation, then practise to create mastery evidence.
Learning objective
• Adaptations improve survival under abiotic conditions such as water availability, salinity, oxygen, and wind • Marram grass has rolled, hairy leaves and thick cuticle to reduce water loss in dunes • Mangroves use aerial roots, pneumatophores, salt exclusion, or salt excretion in saline low-oxygen swamps
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Learning objective
• Species distribution depends on abiotic variables such as temperature, salinity, pH, light, rainfall, humidity, and substratum • Limiting factors can restrict survival, growth, reproduction, or activity by deficiency or excess • Plant limiting factors include light, water, nutrients, carbon dioxide, and temperature
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Learning objective
• A range of tolerance lies between critical minimum and maximum limits • The optimum zone supports highest survival, growth, abundance, and reproduction • Zones of stress and intolerance explain reduced abundance or absence along environmental gradients
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Learning objective
• Coral reefs need warm, shallow, clear, sunlit, saline water with suitable pH • Reef-building corals rely on photosynthetic symbiotic algae • Low nutrients, sediment, cold water, or reduced light can limit reef formation
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Learning objective
• Terrestrial biome distribution is mainly determined by temperature, rainfall, and insolation • Productivity depends strongly on water availability and photosynthesis rate • Latitude and seasonal variation help explain rainforest, temperate forest, taiga, grassland, tundra, and desert distribution
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Learning objective
• Biomes are groups of ecosystems with similar communities due to similar abiotic conditions • Similar biomes can evolve similar forms through convergent evolution • Examples include tropical rainforest, temperate forest, taiga, grassland, tundra, and hot desert
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Learning objective
• Hot desert strategies include expire, evade, or endure under heat and water scarcity • Camels, cacti, scorpions, and kangaroo rats show water-saving, heat-avoidance, or storage adaptations • Tropical rainforest adaptations include pitcher plant nutrient capture, gibbon brachiation, flying lizard gliding, and orchid mantis mimicry
Start with the concept explanation, then practise to create mastery evidence.