Unit 7 Reflection

Unit 7 was focused on ecology. Although we learned about the basics of ecology, it seemed as if everything changed or specified with another vodcast. The most common big ideas were homeostasis and interdependence, but I found that interdependence was more present while we focused on the lack of homeostasis. By this I mean that there were so many threats and changes to the ecosystems that native organisms could not adapt fast enough. One example is how climate change in ecosystems is a major factor in the extinction of organisms. After learning the basics, we learned about the food chains and food webs. At first, I thought that food chains were as far as life goes, but apparently it gets much more complicated. The most abstract and interesting thing about this topic is an alternating extinction. If a secondary consumer goes extinct, then the then the tertiary consumer goes extinct while the primary consumer flourishes. This would later translate into the primary producers going extinct due to the overwhelming numbers of primary consumers. The fact that only 10% of the energy of an organism is passed along to its predator is still surprising. They reason is because of the waste factors like heat and feces. However, it is still only 10% that travels throughout the organisms. I wonder what would happen if the numbers were to all of a sudden increase. Would there be a flourishing of all species due to less food consumption for the same amount of energy, or would it lead to sport hunting after a while? Populations was a pretty fun topic to cover considering the fact that I learned most about this topic. I knew that there was such a thing as overpopulation, but that was the extent of my knowledge. I did not know about carrying capacity and that humans were closing in on the estimated carrying capacity at an alarming rate. The ecosystem health vodcast was an eye-opener for me, as I did not know humans were doing as much damage as they really are. I was surprised to see the data visualized into graphs and tables, and see to alarming coincidence about the 6th mass extinction and the growth of humans. I did not know that Exotic/Introduced species was such a major factor in the destruction/extinction of species. I thought it would simply lead to overpopulation. The vodcasts in this unit were enjoyable because they also incorporated common sense, and were not just information thrown at you.

I am really interested in the 6th mass extinction on the way of reaching a breaking point. I want to learn more about the limits of the planet such as the carrying capacity and what animals would be affected by the extinction. I would also like to learn more about the exotic/introduced species, mostly because it has effects that I did not know about. I would also like to test multiple hypothetical situations such as 'what if we introduced an exotic species but also brought that species' predator to maintain populations. This predator could be a secondary consumer or a quaternary consumer, but I think the latter would do better due to the lack of energy they receive, which will keep their population size low. Another hypothetical possibility would be to only bring in decomposers, which would not lead to extinction, mostly due to the organisms feeding on things that are already dead.

For the Conservative Biologist Project, I worked in a group with Eng Kwa, Karthi Sankar, and Shreya Katkere. In my opinion, we worked rather well together, but that was partly to the fact that I slightly dominated in the beginning. Well, it was really more like taking initiative, because I just lead the group through the team contract. Soon, however, they got the hang of such things and began to work together equally. The project ran rather smoothly, and mostly everyone was assertive at different points. There were times where I dominated slightly because I had felt that no one else was stepping up and leading,  but I don't think I was aggressive or overly dominant. In my opinion, I was more assertive in leading. I say this because I prompted some group members to do their work or to go the extra mile for the project.