32 terms

Terms	Definitions
Biosphere	The entire portion of Earth inhabited by life; the sum of all the planet's ecosystems
Ecosystem	All the organisms in a given area, along with the nonliving (abiotic) factors with which they interact; a biological community and its physical environment
Community	An assemblage of all the organisms living together and potentially interacting in a particular area
Population	A group of interacting individuals belonging to ones species and living in the same geographic area
Organism	An individual living thing, such as a bacterium, fungus, protist, plant or animal
Organ System	A group of organs that work together in performing vital body functions
Organs	A structure consisting of several tissues adapted as a group to perform specific functions
Tissue	A cooperative unit of many similar cells that perform a specific function with a multicellular organism.
Cell	A basic unit of living matter separated from it environment by a plasma membrane; the fundamental structural unit of life
Organelle	A structure with a specialized function within a cell
Molecule	a group of two or more atoms held together by covalent bonds
Atom	The smallest unit of matter that retains the properties of an element
Producer	An organism that makes organic food molecules from carbon dioxide, water, and other inorganic raw materials: a plant, alga, or autotrophic bacterium
Consumer	An organism that obtains its food by eating plants or by eating animals that have eaten plants
Decomposer	A consumer that derives its energy from nonliving organic material
Emergent Properties	New properties that emerge with each step upward in the hierarchy of life, owing to the arrangement and interactions of parts as complexity increases
System	A more complex organization formed from a combination of components
Prokaryotic cell	A type of cell lacking a membrane-enclosed nucleus and other membrane-enclosed organelles; found only in the domains Bacteria and Archaea
Eukaryotic cell	A type of cell that has a membrane-enclosed nucleus and other membrane-enclosed organelles. All organisms except bacteria and archaea are composed of eukaryotic cells
species	a group whose members possess similar anatomical characteristics and have the ability to interbreed.
Taxonomy	The branch of biology concerned with identifying, naming, and classifying species
Kingdom	In classification, the broad taxonomic category above phylum or division
Domain	A taxonomic category above the kingdom level. The three domains of life are Archaea, Bacteria, and Eukarya
Bacteria	One of two prokaryotic domains of life, the other being Archaea
Archaea	One of two prokaryotic domains of life, the other being bacteria
Prokaryote	An organism with prokaryotic cells
Theory	A widely accepted explanatory idea that is broad in scope and supported by a large body of evidence
Natural Selection	Differential success in reproduction by different phenotypes resulting from interactions with the environment. Evolution occurs when natural selection produces changes in the relative frequencies of alleles in a population's gene pool
Evolutionary adaption	a inherited characteristic that enhances an organism's ability to survive and reproduce in a particular environment
hypothesis	A tentative explanation a scientist proposes for a specific phenomenon that has been observed
controlled experiment	A component of the process of science whereby a scientist carries out two parallel tests, an experimental test and a control test. The experimental test differs from the control by one factor, the variable
technology	The practical application of scientific knowledge

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