This course introduces students to core principles, classic experiments, ongoing research, and current events in ecology. Students examine interactions between species (biotic), and their environment (abiotic). Topics span individual organisms, populations, communities, ecosystems, and the biosphere, and explores how humans fit into and affect the natural world.
Athena Title
Ecology
Equivalent Courses
Not open to students with credit in ECOL 3505H, FANR 3200W
Prerequisite
[(BIOL 1104 and BIOL 1104L) or (BIOL 1108 and BIOL 1108L) or (BIOL 2108H and BIOL 2108L)] and [(CHEM 1211 and CHEM 1211L) or (CHEM 1311H and CHEM 1311L)]
Corequisite
ECOL 3500L
Semester Course Offered
Offered fall and spring
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Student learning Outcomes
Students will explain what drives the distribution and abundance of organisms, and how they interact with each other and their environment.
Students will describe core ecological concepts as they apply to individuals, populations, communities, and ecosystems.
Students will analyze and interpret ecological data in the scientific literature.
Students will assess the impact of humans on ecological systems using relevant examples.
Topical Outline
Life and the Physical Environment:
-Global climate systems (temperature and precipitation patterns)
-The biome concept
-Organisms and the abiotic environment
Organisms:
-Evolution, adaptation, and phenotypic plasticity
-Life-history tradeoffs
-Sexual selection
Populations:
-Population distributions
-Population growth and regulation
-Meta populations
Communities:
-Species interactions: predation, competition, mutualism, and parasitism
-Community structure, food webs, trophic cascades and succession
-Diversity metrics, species coexistence and drivers of species diversity
-Disease ecology
Ecosystems and Landscapes:
-Ecosystem energetics
-Carbon and nutrient cycling
-Landscape ecology
