Ecology and Environmental Protection D 1400-112EKO

Ecology as a scientific discipline, the scope of interests, a definition. The popular understanding of ecology; ecology as the science of natural environment. The genesis of ecology. Ecology and problems of the contemporary world. Basic ecological terms (environment, habitat, limiting factor, population, ecosystem etc.). Ecology and the science of evolution. Variability and natural selection. Ecological consequences of diversified reproductiveness and survival. Adaptations. Life strategies and the evolution of their most important parameters. Conflicts, compromises or evolutionary dilemmas. The optimization theory. Interactions between organisms and the environment, ecological tolerance, ecological niche. Physiology and ecology of an individual, energy balance. A population as a set of individuals. Interactions between individuals. Demographic parameters and population processes. Isolated populations. Metapopulations. The ecology of interspecies interactions: interference and exploitation. The evolution of biotic interactions; coevolution. A biocenosis as a set of individuals of different species. Biocenosis structure. Biodiversity and methods of its assessment. The concept of an ecosystem. Trophic structure, bioenergetics of food chains. Productivity of ecosystems. Ecological succession, climax. Ecological units higher than an ecosystem. The concept of ecological landscape. Perspectives and tendencies of ecology development in Poland and in the world. Applications of ecology in nature protection and shaping the environment. Biodiversity protection