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   Population Interactions For any species, the minimal requirement is one more species on which it can feed. Even a plant species, which makes its own food, cannot survive alone; it needs soil microbes to break down the organic matter in soil and return the inorganic nutrients for absorption. In nature, animals, plants and microbes interact in various ways to form a biological community. Interspecific interactions arise from the interaction of populations of two different species. They could be beneficial, detrimental or neutral (neither harm nor benefit) to one of the species or both. Assigning a ‘+’ sign for beneficial interaction, ‘-’ sign for detrimental and 0 for neutral interaction, look at all the possible outcomes of interspecific interactions. Species A Species B Name of Interaction + + Mutualism - - Competition + - Predation + - Parasitism + 0 Commensalism - 0 Amensalism Both the species benefit in mutualism and both lose in competition in their interactions with ea...
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CHAPTER 11 - ORGANISMS AND POPULATIONS

  Organism A biological identity who interacts within itself and with its surrounding is called an organism. Levels of Biological Organisation There are four levels of biological organisation in ecology - organisms populations communities biomes Population A group(s) of organisms(individuals) living in a well defined geographical area, share or compete for similar resources, potentially interbreed - constitute a population. e.g. the cormorants in a wetland, rats in an abandoned dwelling, teakwood trees in a forest tract, bacteria in a culture plate and lotus plants in a pond. Population A ttributes Attributes - A population has certain attributes Birth rates and Death rates - a population has birth rates and death rates. In a population these rates refer to per capita births and deaths. For example - If in a pond there were 20 lotus plants last year and through reproduction 8 new plants are added, taking the curre...
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CHAPTER 10 - BIOTECHNOLOGY AND ITS APPLICATIONS

  Biotechnology Biotechnology deals with industrial scale production of biopharmaceuticals and biologicals using genetically modified microbes, fungi, plants and animals. Applications of Biotechnology It includes - therapeutics diagnostics genetically modified crops for agriculture processed food bioremediation waste treatment energy production Research Areas of Biotechnology Three critical research areas of biotechnology are - Providing the best catalyst in the form of improved organism usually a microbe or pure enzyme Creating optimal conditions through engineering for a catalyst to act Downstream processing technologies to purify the protein/organic compound Biotechnology Applications of Agriculture Biotechnology is being used for increasing food production through - agro-chemical based agriculture organic agriculture genetically engineered crop-based agriculture Somatic Hybridisation ...
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CHAPTER 9 - BIOTECHNOLOGY : PRINCIPLES AND PROCESSES

  Biotechnology Biotechnology deals with techniques of using live organisms or enzymes from organisms to produce products and processes useful to humans. The European Federation of Biotechnology (EFB) has given a definition of biotechnology that encompasses both traditional view and modern molecular biotechnology. The definition given by EFB is as follows: "The integration of natural science and organisms, cells, parts thereof, and molecular analogues for products and services". Principles of Biotechnology There are two core techniques that enabled modern biotechnology. They are as below: (i) Genetic engineering - Techniques to alter the chemistry of genetic material (DNA and RNA), to introduce these into host organisms and thus change the phenotype of the host organism. (ii) Bioprocess engineering - Maintenance of sterile (microbial contamination-free) ambience in chemical engineering processes to enable growth of only the desired micro...
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