Environmental Science Study Guide
for the Midterm-Semester 1
Chapter 1 Understanding our environment
Environment
Biocentric preservation
Extreme poverty
Environmental science
Environmentalism
Stewardship
Biodiversity
Utilitarian conservation
Sustainable development Global environmentalism
Environmental racism
President Teddy Roosevelt
John Muir
1. Explain what environmental science is, and how it draws on different kinds of
knowledge.
2. Be able to identify and describe some current concerns in environmental science.
3. Identify some early thinkers on environmental health.
4. Explain how poverty and resource distribution affects our environment.
5. Identify ways in which faith-based groups share concerns for our environment.
Case Study p. 13
China’s Green Future?
Why should we care about what happens in China?
Chapter 2
Principles of Science and Systems
Reproducibility
Controlled study
Dependent variable
Positive feedback
Emergent properties
Deductive reasoning
Blind experiments
Independent variable
Negative feedback
Paradigm shifts
Hypothesis
Theory
Double-blind experiments
Open system
Closed system
Homeostasis
Pseudoscience
1. Describe the scientific method and explain how it works. Include deductive reasoning,
hypothesis, experimental design, etc.
2. Explain systems and how emergent properties affect how an environmental system
works.
3. How do you detect pseudoscience?
4. What is the relationship between environmental science and environmentalism?
5. Explain why there are no laws in the life sciences?
6. Give an example of a paradigm shift occurring today.
7. Identify the difference between a dependent and independent variable.
Case study p. 37
Field experiments test value of biodiversity
What was the general lesson in this case study? Was it better to have biodiversity
in farming or not to have biodiversity? Why?
Chapter 3
Matter, energy, and life
Ecology
Kinetic energy
Photosynthesis
Community
Food chain
Omnivores
CARBON SINKS
pH scale
Potential energy
Cellular respiration
Ecosystem
Trophic level
Decomposer
Nitrogen cycle
Organic compounds
Chemical energy
Species
Producers
Herbivores
Hydrologic cycle
Energy
Extremophiles
Population
Consumers
Carnivores
Carbon cycle
1. What is an organic compound? Give an example
2. What is the fundamental unit of life?
3. Be able to understand how living organisms capture energy and create organic
compounds. …from the sun and to the bottom of the ocean….
4. How do food chains, food webs, and trophic levels link species?
5. Be able to follow a molecule of carbon, nitrogen and water through an earth cycle.
6. Why is the population density of large carnivores always very small compared to the
population density of herbivores occupying the same ecosystem?
7. Where does the energy come from allowing an ecosystem to function?
Case study p. 52
Why trees need salmon
Be able to explain the relationship between salmon and trees.
Chapter 7
Human populations
J curve
Exponential growth
Zero population growth Crude death rate
Immigration
Demography
Crude birth rate
Life expectancy
Carrying capacity
Total fertility rate
Emigration
1. Be able to trace the history of human population growth.
2. Does environment or culture control human populations? Explain.
3. How does technology affect the carrying capacity for humans?
4. How many people live on earth right now? USA? China?
5. What are some of the issues that affect the environment now that we are living
longer?
6. How has ‘birth control’ played a part in population growth in developed countries?
7. Be able to read population graphs/charts.
Case study p. 132
Family planning in Thailand
How did Thailand’s growth rate go from 3.2 to 0.7 in 40 years?
Chapter 8
Environmental health and toxicology
Health
DALYs
Toxins
Allergens
Carcinogens
Acute effects
Disease
Pathogens
Morbidity
Emergent disease
Mortality
Ecological disease
Sick building syndrome
Conservation medicine
Endocrine disrupter
Neurotoxins
Bioaccumulation
Chronic effects
Mutagens
Biomagnification
Risk assessment
Teratogens
Persistent organic pollutants (POPs)
1. Describe how global disease burden is now changing.
2. How do toxins affect us?
3. How does diet influence health?
4. Be able to show the movement, distribution, and fate of toxins in the environment.
5. How does exposure and susceptibility determine how we respond to toxins?
6. Be able to give an example of biomagnifications of a toxin and how it may affect your
health.
7. How do acute and chronic doses of toxins differ?
8. Give some examples of emergent diseases.
Case study p. 155
Defeating the fiery serpent
How is the guinea worm acquired and how do you get rid of it from your body?
Chapter 9
Food and hunger
Chronically undernourished
Anemia
Aquaculture
Genetic engineering
Food security
Malnourishment
GMO
Locavore
Famines
Protein deficiency
Green revolution
Obese
CAFO
Famine
1. Do famines have political and social causes? Explain.
2. What are vitamins and why are they so important to our diet?
3. Explain the difference in ‘food issues’ between a developed and developing country.
4. Why is there such interest in seafood and aquaculture?
5. Explain why eating a cow is more costly to the environment than a chicken.
6. How has genetic engineering helped world hunger and cost of food in developed
countries?
7. GMO’s …benefits and concerns…
8. What is the “green revolution” and why was it important?
9. List any five of the most abundant food sources produced worldwide. What three food
sources are most abundant in the United States?
Case study p. 179
Becoming a Locavore in the dining hall
Explain the benefits to eating food grown locally. Explain the problems associated
with being a locavore and helping with ‘world hunger’.
Documentaries shown during Semester 1
Make sure you bring to the forefront of your mind the common ideas of these
documentaries.
YERT
GASLAND
BLUE GOLD
FOOD INC.