Biology is designed for multi-semester biology courses for science majors. It is grounded on an evolutionary basis and includes exciting features that highlight careers in the biological sciences and everyday applications of the concepts at hand. To meet the needs of today’s instructors and students, some content has been strategically condensed while maintaining the overall scope and coverage of traditional texts for this course. Instructors can customize the book, adapting it to the approach that works best in their classroom. Biology also includes an innovative art program that incorporates critical thinking and clicker questions to help students understand—and apply—key concepts.

By the end of this section, you will be able to:Discuss the biogeochemical cycles of water, carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus, and sulfurExplain how human activities have impacted these cycles and the potential consequences for Earth

By the end of this section, you will be able to:Describe the basic types of ecosystems on EarthExplain the methods that ecologists use to study ecosystem structure and dynamicsIdentify the different methods of ecosystem modelingDifferentiate between food chains and food webs and recognize the importance of each

By the end of this section, you will be able to:Describe how organisms acquire energy in a food web and in associated food chainsExplain how the efficiency of energy transfers between trophic levels affects ecosystem structure and dynamicsDiscuss trophic levels and how ecological pyramids are used to model them

Biology is designed for multi-semester biology courses for science majors. It is grounded on an evolutionary basis and includes exciting features that highlight careers in the biological sciences and everyday applications of the concepts at hand. To meet the needs of today’s instructors and students, some content has been strategically condensed while maintaining the overall scope and coverage of traditional texts for this course. Instructors can customize the book, adapting it to the approach that works best in their classroom. Biology also includes an innovative art program that incorporates critical thinking and clicker questions to help students understand—and apply—key concepts.

This online course will introduce various climatic and ecological modelling tools and guide the students to practical applications of scale-free climate models and niche-based ecological models in forest and ecological (such as birds, fish and animals) resource management to increase the resilience and viability of forest ecosystems. By the end of the course, students will master skills and techniques to, 1) use climatic models to generate spatial climate data; 2) understand niche-based ecological models; and 3) interpret and apply model output to forest management practice.

The course is designed for forest professionals who are interested in professional forestry and forest adaptation to climate change.

This resource contains materials for chapters 11-15 and 19-21 from the Concepts of Biology OpenStax OER book by Rice University. It includes materials to be used for a General Biology II course (or Introduction to Biology II course) for non-science majors.

How often have you heard in the past five years the expression “I have never seen a ….fire/flood/drought/rainstorm/insect infestation/sea level rise…of this magnitude, ever.”? The world’s climate is out of balance, and in this state, is driving ecosystem changes that few of us have seen in our lifetimes. What is the scale of these changes now and into the future? How will this affect the way you work and live? How can we adapt? The practice of ecological restoration can point the way to positive actions at the ground level.

This online learning session will bring into focus the practice of restoration of ecosystems at the local and regional level in British Columbia through a series of presentations delivered by faculty from UVic’s School of Environmental Studies, First Nations speakers and Elders, and professionals whose work intersects with ecology in diverse ways. We start by rooting our introduction in Indigenous perspectives on how the local ecosystems are changing. We discuss basic principles and practices of ecological restoration on the ground. We then explore the complexity of British Columbia’s biodiversity, basic drivers of change in ecosystems, and the challenges they present in different types of ecosystems. We look at how climate change models help us understand what the future scale of change might be, and we finish up by discussing how ecological restoration principles can apply to different disciplines.

This open textbook covers the most salient environmental issues, from a biological perspective. The text is designed for an introductory-level college science course. Topics include the fundamentals of ecology, biodiversity, pollution, climate change, food production, and human population growth.

Lecture slides for each chapter are available from https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/119oj6XXHnQMpwu_rCgczDFrZPMbqGN8W

This is a survey course in which we will discuss the science behind historical and current environmental issues. We will discuss the major threats to biodiversity and ecosystem function. We will study how human activities have affected the limited resources of our planet. We will learn how air, water and soil degradation have affected human health. Lastly, we will explore the emerging field of sustainability, what it means, and how it is being applied in todayęs world.