Organisms and Populations

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Ecology is a branch of biological science that deals with complex interactions among organisms and between organisms and their environment. The term comes from Greek words meaning house and study of.

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Ernst Haeckel, a German biologist, is generally credited as the first to use the term ecology in 1886 to describe the sum of the relations of organisms to the surrounding outer world.

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The five levels are organism, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere. Each higher level includes more complexity and new interactions.

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A population is a group of interacting individuals of the same species living in a specific physical place, called the habitat. Members share the same gene pool and ecological requirements.

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A population includes individuals of one species in a given area, while a community consists of all populations of different species living together in an area.

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An ecosystem is the interaction of communities with their non-living environment, allowing orderly flow of matter and energy. It is the basic functional unit of ecology.

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All the ecosystems together form the biosphere. It is the giant ecosystem of the Earth where life exists and interacts with the physical environment.

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Autecology studies the relation of a single species with its environment. It focuses on one species and its adaptations, requirements, and responses.