- Settore: Biology
- Number of terms: 15386
- Number of blossaries: 0
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Terrapsychology is a word coined by Craig Chalquist to describe deep, systematic, trans-empirical approaches to encountering the presence, soul, or "voice" of places and things: what the ancients knew as their resident genius loci or indwelling spirit. This perspective emerged from sustained ...
A versatile nucleic acid that combines with a protein to make ribosoomes, the site of protein assembly (ribosomal RNA); copies genetic information from DNA for transformation into proteins (messenger RNA), and incorporates animo acid combinations into developing proteins (transfer RNA). The RNA molecule is identical to DNA (from which it is made) except for the sugar ribose instead of deoxyribose and uracil for thymine. At one time RNA might have been the only form of life (the RNA World hypothesis): it can replicate without a cell nucleus or even any DNA.
Industry:Biology
Sulfur oxides and particulates from industrial plants burning fossil fuels are the current worst forms of air pollution. Auto emissions run a close second. Most air pollution derives in one form or another from the use of petroleum products, oil in particular. See Oil below.
Industry:Biology
A mixture of humus and particles weathered from rock. A cubic yard of soil will cover 300 square feet of ground to a depth of 1 inch. The major nutrients are nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. Bacteria and fungi produce humus. Half the volume of good soil is pore spaces. Microbial decomposers account for 60-80% of total soil metabolism; bacteria drive nitrification, sulfur oxication, and nitrogen fixation. Actinomycete microbes help form humus; they are the most numerous organisms after bacteria. Soil texture means the relative proportions of sand, silt, and clay. We live on 1/12 of the Earth’s surface but have discarded ¾ of its productive soil. Replacement of an inch of topsoil takes 500 years.
Industry:Biology
Force required to hold a moving object in a circular path against its tendency to fly outward. Spinning storms like hurricanes and dust devils exhibit it. The force is proportional to the square of the velocity, which means that doubling the object's speed increases the centripetal force four times.
Industry:Biology
A two-stage type of cell division that creates gametes (sex cells). Because each must contain half a future offspring's DNA (one set from the father and one from the mother), the kind of cell division (mitosis) used elsewhere will not work--it would double the amount of DNA needed. To prevent this, meiosis turns a cell containing 46 chromosomes into four sex cells containing 23 chromosomes each (haploids) through an initial extra stage that mixes chromosomes. Aside from that stage, meiosis is like Mitosis.
Industry:Biology
One of the most wasteful things to do with fresh water. According to Bill Mollision (see Permaculture), cultivated lawns go back to the British Empire and the country estate, both in the business of taming the natural world. Their demand for water is second only to that of agricultural irrigation. Many require petroleum products to maintain and to fertilize, and pesticides to keep pristine despite their ecological vulnerability.
Industry:Biology
An evergreen forest growing in a wt, humid climate. Rainforest coverage prevents desertification and drought and hosts more than half the world's animal species. Every day unchecked industrial development flattens a patch of rainforest the size of New York City.
Industry:Biology
An animal with a backbone. Most large animals are vertebrates. They probably evolved from a wormlike ancestor that turned upside down (upside-down catfish do this today). See Invertebrate.
Industry:Biology
Cut down a forest and make a localized drought. Deforestation is a direct cause of spreading desertification worldwide. Parallel damage to the human psyche remains largely unexplored.
Industry:Biology
From an ecopsychological perspective, a horror of carnality so profound that it seeks to etherealize the body itself. Tends to be overrepresented in highly industrialized nations.
Industry:Biology
