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UPSC » UPSC CSE Study Materials » NCERT Notes for UPSC 2025 » Life on the Earth

Life on the Earth

Ecology, Types of Ecosystem, Structure and Function of the Ecosystem The biosphere includes all living things on earth. It comprises all microorganisms, plants and animals and interactions with the environment. Most organisms exist in the atmosphere, lithosphere and hydrosphere.

Table of Content
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Ecology:  

Ecology may be described as the scientific study of the interactions of organisms with their bodily surroundings and other factors. The interaction of a specific organization of organisms with abiotic elements inside a specific habitat ensuing in genuinely described power flows and cycles on land, water, and air, are referred to as ecological systems. 

Habitat: In the ecological experience it’s far the totality of the bodily and chemical elements that represent the overall surroundings. Different varieties of ecosystems exist with various levels of environmental situations in which diverse flora and animal species have been tailored through evolution. This phenomenon is referred to as ecological adaptation. The surroundings are made up of abiotic and biotic additives. All those additives in the atmosphere are inter-associated and engaged with each other.

Ecosystem types:

There are two main types of ecosystems: Terrestrial and Aquatic.

Terrestrial ecosystem: Can be further divided into “biomes”.

The Biome is a community of flora and fauna that spans a large geographical area. The boundaries of the various biomes on land are primarily determined by climate. The biome can be defined as a whole plant and animal species that interact under specific conditions. This includes precipitation, temperature, humidity, and soil conditions. Some of the most important biomes in the world are forests, grasslands, deserts, and tundra biomes.

Aquatic ecosystems: Can be classified as marine and freshwater ecosystems. A marine ecosystem includes oceans, estuaries, and coral reefs.

Freshwater ecosystems: Includes lakes, ponds, streams, swamps.

Ecosystem Structure and Function: Ecosystem structure contains a description of the available plant and animal species. Abiotic and biotic factors together compose the ecosystems.

Abiotic Factors: These include precipitation, temperature, sunlight, air humidity, soil properties, and inorganic substances (calcium, nitrogen, carbon dioxide, water, potassium, etc.).

Biotic factors: Includes producers, primary, secondary, and tertiary producers, and decomposers.

Producers: This includes all green plants that produce their food by photosynthesis.

Primary Consumer: This includes herbivores such as deer, goats, mice, etc. Primary consumers feed on producers.

Secondary Consumer (Carnivores): This includes all carnivores such as snakes, tigers, and lions. Primary consumers are eaten by secondary consumers.

Tertiary Consumers (Top Carnivores): These are specific carnivores that feed on other carnivores such as hawks and mongooses.

Decomposer: Eat dead organisms (such as scavengers such as vultures and crows) and further decompose dead substances through other decomposers such as bacteria and various microorganisms. Decomposers eat the dead every time. They are converted into various substances such as nutrients, organic salts, and inorganic salts that are essential for soil fertility.

Conclusion

Life is a distinguishing feature that distinguishes physical entities that have biological processes, such as signalling and self-sustaining processes, from those that do not, either because such functions have ceased (they have died) or because such functions were never present and they are classified as inanimate. Plants, mammals, fungi, protists, archaea, and bacteria are all forms of life. Biology is the study of living things.

The Earth is the only known planet that is host to life. Organisms originally formed on Earth over four billion years ago and have shaped the planet’s growth ever since, affecting the composition of the atmosphere and causing the production of various kinds of rock. We study creatures ranging in size from bacteria to plants and animals, focusing on how these species originated and how they survive and interact with one another and with their environment. We engage in a variety of sizes, from molecules to the whole world.

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