GEOS 110 Fall 2013 Final Exam Study Guide
Test cover’s Chapters: 1-10 inclusive in Kump’s Earth System including previous Test 1 and 2 study
guides and all power point notes on Tark’s Website: This test is cumulative so reuse study guides 1 and 2
in addition to this. 40 % of the test will be on Cryosphere, Carbon (and related elements) Cycle,
Biosphere and Origin of Life. The other 60% will be review from prior tests. The Exam is Monday Dec 9
at 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM in Young 211. Questions will cover the text, labs, field trips, Paul Manly’s talk on
Water resources and issues for Vancouver Island as well as the field trip to IOS (zooplankton
oceanography) and PGC (Seismicity and Displays).
The Test format will be 50-70 % Multiple choice, T/F, matching, terms and definitions and the tother 5025% on essays. There will be at least 1 essay per new chapter below.
https://faculty.camosun.ca/tarkhamilton/
You are allowed a 1 page 8.5X11” double sided cheat sheet for diagrams, terms, definitions and notes of
any kind, of your own preparation.
Chapter 8: Recycling of the Elements
Study Questions:
1. What are the main chemical elements involved in biogeochemical recycling and name a reservoir for each, a
physical-chemical-biological process and a rate or residence time for their recycling.?
A. e.g. Nitrogen. NO3 – anions in soils or the ocean, recycling depends on erosion, runoff or upwelling
versus biological useage as fertilizer to aid bacterial or phytoplankton growth (fast, months to years) 2. Which of the carbon reservoirs has the longest residence time: terrestrial plants, the ocean, limestone and
about how long is this?
3. Which is the greatest carbon sink in the Earth system and the ultimate solution to atmospheric carbon dioxide
increase?
4. Describe a biological pump for (CO2 , NO3– and PO4-3 ) what are the 2 reservoirs and which way does it get
pumped?
5. The chemical weathering of silicate minerals and rocks is a net carbon sink with regard to atmospheric CO2
while the chemical weathering of limestone is not. Explain why?
6. How is burning of plant matter or fossil fuels similar to respiration of plants or animals and why do they have
effects in the same direction?
7. The residence time for any particular chemical species is equal to what?
8. If the rainwater is and always has been slightly acidic, why is it that runoff in streams, rivers, lakes and the
ocean they feed are all slightly basic?
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9. Near the end of the Cretaceous about 65Ma, a large meteorite ~ 10 km3 smashed into the Earth near
Chixulub on the Yucatan Peninsula. If this killed all marine plant life, how would this affect the vertical profile
of oxygen in the oceans for the next few thousand years?
10.Graph and describe the annual cycle of atmospheric carbon dioxide in the northern hemisphere as measured
on Mauna Loa, explaining why it rises and falls in a predictable cyclic pattern.
11. What is the key process that maintains an oxygenated atmosphere despite biological activity making
abundant reduced carbon compounds?
12. Name some of the principle reservoir of Carbon in the Carbon cycle and explain why this is not currently at
a steady state condition?
13. Chemical and biological rates of activity generally increase or decrease as the temperature of their
environments change. Why then are the high latitude oceans the most productive and the tropics generally much
poorer?
14. What are the chief controls on the rates of chemical weathering of minerals and rocks, and how does this in
turn affect the carbon cycle?
15. If chemical weathering of apatite in rocks and decomposition of organo-phosphorous compounds both
contribute phosphate (dihydrogen phosphate) and other phosphorous compounds to the oceans, why does the
Phosphorous concentration in the oceans not continually increase?
16. What are the 2 different chemical forms of “fixed nitrogen”?
17. How does the Nitrogen cycle differ from the Phosphorous cycle in terms of its terrestrial inputs and is it
increasing, decreasing or staying the same for its concentration (that of Nitrate) in sea water?
18. Your book states that considering Nitrogen versus Phosphorous, that the latter is the ultimate limiting
nutrient for the Marine Carbon Cycle. Considering the Redfield ratios for C, N, P and Fe in sea water which is
the ultimate limiting nutrient for life in the oceans and why?
19. Is the CaCO3 of marine shells organic or inorganic carbon and why?
Vocabulary:
Abiotic
Acid
Aerobe
Aerobic
Alkaline phosphatase
Ammonia
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Anaerobe
Anaerobic
Anion
Apex Chert
Base
Bicarbonate ion
Biological pump
Biomass
Biosphere
Calcite
Carbohydrate
Carbonate ion
Carbonate metamorphism
Cation
Characteristic response time
Chemical equilibrium
Chemical weathering
Chlorophyll
Coal
Coccolithophorid
Consumers
Corals
Cyanobacteria
Decarbonation reactions (mineral)
Decomposition
Denitrification
Denitrifying bacteria
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Diatom
Diffusion
Dissociation
Dolomite
Fixed nitrogen
Flux rate
Foraminifer
Gas hydrate
Inorganic carbon
Isotopically Light Carbon
Limestone
Long term Carbon Cycle
Methanogen
Methanogenesis
Methanotroph
Nitrogen
Nitrogenase
Nitrous oxide
Nutrient
Organic carbon
Oxidized carbon
Oxygen minimum zone
Petroleum
pH
Photic zone
Photosynthesis
Phytoplankton
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Polymerase Chain Reaction
Porphyrin
Primary producer
Primary productivity
Radiolarian
Redfield ratio
Reduced carbon
Reservoir
Residence time
Respiration
Short term Carbon Cycle
Silicate minerals
Sponges
Steady state
Stromatolites
Terrestrial organic carbon cycle
Toxic
Zooplankton
Chapter 10 Origin of Earth and Life
Study Questions:
20. When and via what processes did Earth’s Atmosphere form?
21. What are the respective ages of the solar system, Earth and Moon and why are they different?
22. What were some of the big turning points for evolution in Earth History?
23.What is so significant about the appearance of the first hard bodied shelly fossils and when was this?
24. Where are interstellar clouds concentrated and how is this significant for star formation?
25. How are large impacts though to relate to Earth’s core formation?
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26. What effects does Jupiter have that influence life on Earth and how might the evolution of life been different
in a solar system without a Jupiter sized body.
27. What are the 2 big effects that the Moon has on earth’s present day climate and other surface conditions?
28. How is the composition of the Moon different from and similar to Earth and what bearing does this have on
the Moon/s origin?
29.When was the Heavy Bombardment Period and what is the evidence for this?
Vocabulary:
Accretion
Amino Acids
Archaea
Bacteria
Black Smoker
Carbon Monoxide
Chemical Evolution
Chondrites
Condensation (of refractory materials)
Cyanide
Domains
Ejecta
Enzyme
Eon
Eukarya
Formaldehyde
Giant Impact Hypothesis
Giant Planets (Gas Giants)
Haldane (Oparin-Haldane) Hypothesis
Heavy Bombardment Period
Hertzprung-Russell (H-R) Diagram
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Hydrothermal Vents
Hydroxyl Radicals
Hyperthermophyllic (Thermophyllic) Bacteria
IDP’s (Interplanertary Dust Particles)
Impact Degassing
Interstellar Clouds
Isochron Diagram
Lead-Lead Dating
Macrofossils
Magma Ocean
Main Sequence Stars
Meteorites
Methane
Microfossils
Migration
Miller-Urey Experiments (Reducing Atmosphere)
Mutation
Nice Model
Natural Selection
Nucleotides
Organisms
Paleontologists
Photolyzed
Planetesimals
Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR)
Proteins
Proto-Sun
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Pyrite
Replication
Ribosomes
RNA World
Serpentinization (Serpentine-Asbestos)
Shelly Fossils (Cambrian Explosion of Life)
Solar Nebula
Strongly Reduced Atmosphere
Terrestrial Planets
Ultramafic Rocks
Volatile Compounds
Weakly Reduced Atmosphere
Zircon
Chapter 9: Focus on Biota
Study Questions:
30. What are the 4 common characteristics (requirements, behaviours) of all living things?
31. Name a specific organism which is an autotroph and another with is a heterotrophy and detail their general:
metabolic pathway or requirement, the reactants or inputs they receive from their environment and their waste
or byproducts that result from their metabolism/respiration.
32. What are 2 different types of methanogens and what is different about their metabolic pathways?
33. What is the biosphere and where are the physical limits of its extent on Earth?
34. Is Canada’s boreal forest a population, a biome, a community or an ecosystem and what kind of positive or
negative feedbacks exist between this and the climate in the high latitude regions?
35. Under which conditions of climate, temperature and CO2 abundance do C3 plants thrive versus C4 plants
and give an example of each type
36. Why are tropical plant species more vulnerable to a changing climate than tropical ones?
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37. Consider the sensitivity and restrictions on a transitional ecotone in light of rapidly changing climates and
quick shifts in bounding ecosystems. How can climate change lead to loss of biodiversity and extinctions in this
type of model or adjacent bands of systems?
38. Provide examples of symbiosis, the 2 organisms involved and discuss the advantages and vulnerability this
brings.
39. What is the difference between counting the number of species in a community or ecosystem versus
biodiversity. Use your explanation to account for the robustness and relative stability of more biodiverse
communities.
40. Explain why redundancy (multiple pathways to do the same thing: photosynthesis, decomposition, predation
etc) is essential to maintaining stable ecosystems and Earth Systems which depend on them.
41. Explain the shortcoming of basing human agriculture, food webs and biofuels on singular genetically
engineered or restricted genome C-4 crops like sugar cane, corn etc compared to more diverse C-3 plants.
Vocabulary:
Autotrophs
Biodiversity
Biomass
Biomes
C3 versus C4 plants
Community
Ecosystem
Ecotone
Exploitation Efficiency
Food Chain
Food Web
Heterotrophs
Intermediate diversity hypothesis
Population
Redundancy
Succession
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Symbiont
Symbiosis
Time Stability Hypothesis
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