Biosphere as a system for guaranteeing of human existence

1. Biosphere as a system for guaranteeing of human existence Lecturer: ass. NedoshytkoKh. Yu.

2. PLAN • The structure of biosphere • Ecosystem as a unit of biosphere • Human ecology as ecology of Homo sapiens • Pollution of environment

3. At the first time the term "biosphere" was coined by austrian geologist Eduard Suess in 1875; he defined: The biosphere is the aggregate of different organisms that live on Earth's surface. • In the 1929 the term "Biosphere" was coined by Russian scientist Vladimir Vernadsky as: The biosphere is the life zone of the Earth and consists of all living organisms, including human beings, and all organic matters.

4. The structure of biosphere Biosphere has 3 phases of substances: • Liquid • Solid • Gas The parts of hydrosphere, atmosphere and lithosphere (where the organisms live) belong to biosphere.

5. Atmosphere • The atmosphere is composed of nitrogen, oxygen, argon, water vapor, and a number of trace gases. This composition has remained relatively constant throughout much of Earth's history. Different processes and chemical reactions (such as transpiration and condensation of water, photosynthesis, the formation of air flow, climate and weather) run in atmosphere. Chemical reactions maintain the ratios of major constituents of the atmosphere to each other. For example, oxygen is released into the atmosphere by photosynthesis and consumed by respiration. The concentration of oxygen in the atmosphere is maintained by a balance between these two processes: • Photosynthesis: CO2 + H2O + light → "CH2O" + O2Respiration: "CH2O" + O2 → CO2 + H2O + energy • "CH2O" denotes the average composition of organic matter.

6. Atmospheric gas composition (average). Concentrations of gases shown in color are rising due to human activities.

7. Atmosphere structure • Earth's atmosphere extends more than 560 kilometers (348 miles) above the planet's surface and is divided into four layers, each of which has distinct thermal, chemical, and physical properties. Life can exist only in the lowest part of atmosphere – troposphere.

8. Hydrosphere • Water is essential substance for all living organisms on Earth and plays a key role in the evolution and development of life on our planet. • The biosphere as we know would not exist without liquid water (for example, planet of Solar system Mars). • Water is also important for living organisms to transport the soluble nutrients (phosphates and nitrates).

9. Hydrosphere structure • Oceans are divided into zones that offer a wide range of conditions for life.

10. Lithosphere • Soil is the component of lithosphere. It contains mineral and organic matters. All living organisms can use these matters for their nutrition and development.

11. Lithosphere structure

12. Anthroposphere It is that part of the environment that is made or modified by humans for use for human activities and human habitats.It is sometimes also called technosphere. Human population causes the destruction of different parts of biosphere (deforestation, desertification, pollution etc.).

13. Ecology As the human activity has negative influence to nature, nowadays there is a new sciense – ecology. Ecology is the scientific study of relationships in the natural world. It includes relationships -between organisms and their physical environments (physiological ecology); -between organisms of the same species (population ecology); -between organisms of different species (community ecology); -between organisms and the fluxes of matter and energy through biological systems (ecosystem ecology).

14. Ecosystem is the complex association of plants, animals, fungi, and microorganisms that interact with their nonliving environment in such way to regulate the flow of energy through them and the cycling ofnutrients within them. Ecosystem consists of both living (biotic)and nonliving (abiotic)components.

15. Abiotic factors They include: • soil, • water, • light, • inorganic matters, • weather.

16. Biotic factors They are the factors of the living nature. There are 2 forms of interaction of biotic factors: • Predation; • Symbiosis.

17. Predation One animal, the predator kills and eats another animal, the prey.

18. Symbiosis It is a biological relationship in which two dissimilar organisms live together in a close association. Biologists distinguish three main types of symbiosis: • parasitism, • commensalisms, • mutualism.

19. Parasitism It is a relationship where one species benefits and the other is harmed.

20. Commensalisms It is a relationship where one species benefits and the other is not affected. Entamoeba coli Mutualism It is a relationship where both species benefit . Escherichia coli

21. Living components • Producers are autotrophic organisms with the capability of carrying on photosynthesis and making food for themselves (green plants on land and algae in water). A plant fixes about 1% of the solar energy that falls on its green parts. • Photosynthesis – a process where by chlorophyll-containing organisms trap sunlight energy to build a sugar from carbon dioxide and water.

22. Living components • Concumers are heterotrophic organisms that use preformed food. There are 4 types of consumers: • Herbivores (primary consumers)feed directly on green plants or plant products. Examples are grasshoppers, mice, rabbits, deer, beavers, moose, cows, sheep, goats and groundhogs. • Carnivores (secondary or tertiary, consumers) feed on only other animals. Examples are foxes, frogs, snakes, hawks, and spiders.

23. Living components • Omnivoresfeed on both plants and animals. Examples of omnivores are:bears, turtles, monkeys, squirrels.A human being eating both leafy green vegetables and beef is an omnivore too. • Decomposersfeed on detritus. There are a bacterial and fungal species.

24. Every ecosystem is characterized by 2 fundamental phenomena: • -energy flow • -chemical cycling

25. Chemical cycling • nitrogen cycle • oxygen cycle • water cycle • carbon cycle

26. Energy flow It occurs because all the energy content of organic food is eventually lost to the environment as heat. It begins when producers absorb solar energy.

27. Energy and nutrient transfer through ecosystems

28. The sequence of organisms through which energy may move in a community is called a food chain.

30. As the human population increases in size, the space allotted to natural ecosystems is reduced in size. Natural ecosystems are then no longer able to process and rid the biosphere of wastes, which accumulate and are called pollutants.

31. Pollutants are substances added to the environment, particularly by human activities, that lead to undesirable effects for all living things. Human beings add pollutants to all parts of the biosphere - land, water and air.

32. The high level of industry and agriculture concentration and human economic activities lead to terrible situation that human life in many countries is ecologically dangerous. The pollution of environment (water pollution, air pollution, land pollution) has the negative influence to human health. That is why nowadays a new branch of ecological science begins to develop. It is human ecology.

33. Human ecology is an academic discipline that deals with the association between humans and their natural environment.

34. Human ecology views human communities and human populations as part of the ecosystem of Earth. Itis the special ecology of the species Homo sapiens. In the world, human ecology was established as a sociological field in the 1920's, although geographers were using the term much earlier.

35. Nowadays the main development line of human ecology is directed to the decision of the problems by the environment, ways of the rational usage of nature , the optimization of human life conditions in diverse anthropological systems.

36. Human ecology explores not only the influence of humans on their environment but also the influence of the environment on human behaviour and health. It is a way of thinking about the world, and a context in which we should define our questions and ways to answer those questions. ? ? ? ? ? ?

37. The object of investigation is the system: Environment Human

38. The structure of environment

39. The place of human ecology in the system of ecological sciences

40. The main tasks of human ecology: the investigation of human health condition; the research of dynamics of human health condition in the process of historical and social-economical development; the forecast of the health condition of the future generations; the investigation of the processes of human health protection; the analysis of global and regional problems of human ecology; the research of influence of environmental factors to human health; the composition of medical-geographical maps that show the territorial differentiation of human diseases; the addition of medical-geographical maps and environmental pollution maps and the determination of correlative dependence between human diseases and environmental pollution; the determination of value of boundary technogenic load limit to human organism.

41. Human ecology uses many methods of investigation: Human ecology is connected with many sciences: mathematical; statistical; biochemical; physical; bacteriological; clinical; physiological etc. immunology; hygiene of environment; ecotoxicology; medical geography etc.

42. The main terms of human ecology: • Hygiene standard – is the definite range of values of the environmental factor which is optimal or is not dangerous for human health, activity and life; • Maximum permissible concentration – is maximum amount of toxic substance in unit of volume or mass of water, air or soil which does not have any influence to human health; • Maximum permissible level – is periodical or permanent influence of the environmental factor to human organism which can not cause any diseases or changes in human health condition; • Maximum permissible dose– is the amount of toxic substance which penetrating in human organism does not hurt it.

43. In real conditions humans feel the influence of different environmental factors.

44. The influence of physical factors to human organism • solar activity – there is the close connection between death, birth and solar activity.

45. If there are spots on the sun surface, people have bad mood, their activity is reduced, there is an accentuation of chronic diseases, especially diseases of cardiovascular and central nervous systems.

46. weather – it can have different influence to human organism. It influences to human behavior and psychological condition. Many peoples suffer foehnic disease 1-2 days before the beginning wind weather;

47. temperature – high temperature can change the immunological reactionary of human organism, reduces the attention and causes anemia. Low temperature can change the system of thermoregulation of human organism. It reduces metabolism and immunological reactions to different infections.

48. The influence of anthropogenic factors to human organism • ozone hole – it can pass ultraviolet rays that effect human cells, cause mutations.

49. Effects on humans UVB(the higher energy UV radiation absorbed by ozone) is generally accepted to be a contributory factor toskin canser. In addition, increased surface UV leads to increased tropospheric ozone, which is a health risk to humans. 1. Basal and Squamous Cell Carcinomas.They are the most common forms of skin cancer in humans. The mechanism by which UVB induces these cancers is well understood—absorption of UVB radiation causes the pyrimidine bases in the DNA molecule to form dimers, resulting in transcription errors when the DNA replicates. These cancers are relatively mild and rarely fatal, although the treatment of squamous cell carcinoma sometimes requires extensive reconstructive surgery. 2. Malignant Melanoma. It isanother form of skin cancer, malignant melanoma, is much less common but far more dangerous, being lethal in about 15–20% of the cases diagnosed. The relationship between malignant melanoma and ultraviolet exposure is not yet well understood, but it appears that both UVB and UVA are involved. 3. Cortical Cataracts.There is an association between ocular cortical cataracts and UVB. There are data that percentage of this disease among white women are lower than white men. So the risk is bigger in men. Moreover, there are no data linking sunlight exposure to risk of cataract in African Americans. Increased Tropospheric Ozone. Increased surface UV leads to increased tropospheric ozone. Ground-level ozone is generally recognized to be a health risk, asozone is toxic due to its strong oxidant properties.

50. greenhouse effect – it is the increase of environmental temperature (global warming) that has negative influence to human organism.