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Population ecology

 

 
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Population ecology
 
 
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Population ecology is a major sub-field of ecology
Ecology

Ecology is the science study of the distribution and Abundance of life and the interactions between organisms and their nature environment ....
 that deals with the dynamics of species
Species

In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring....
 population
Population

File:Population density.pngIn biology, a population is the collection of inter-breeding organisms of a particular species; in sociology, a collection of human beings....
s and how these populations interact with the environment
Natural environment

The natural environment, commonly referred to simply as the environment, is a term that encompasses all life and non-living things occurring nature on Earth or some region thereof....
.

The older term, autecology (from Greek: a?t?, auto, "self"; ?????, oikos, "household"; and ?????, logos, "knowledge") refers to roughly the same field of study, coming from the division of ecology into autecology—the study of individual species in relation to the environment—and synecology
Community ecology

Community ecology is a subdiscipline of ecology which studies the distribution, abundance, demography, and biological interactions between coexisting populations....
—the study of groups of organisms in relation to the environment—or community ecology.






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Encyclopedia


Population ecology is a major sub-field of ecology
Ecology

Ecology is the science study of the distribution and Abundance of life and the interactions between organisms and their nature environment ....
 that deals with the dynamics of species
Species

In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring....
 population
Population

File:Population density.pngIn biology, a population is the collection of inter-breeding organisms of a particular species; in sociology, a collection of human beings....
s and how these populations interact with the environment
Natural environment

The natural environment, commonly referred to simply as the environment, is a term that encompasses all life and non-living things occurring nature on Earth or some region thereof....
.

The older term, autecology (from Greek: a?t?, auto, "self"; ?????, oikos, "household"; and ?????, logos, "knowledge") refers to roughly the same field of study, coming from the division of ecology into autecology—the study of individual species in relation to the environment—and synecology
Community ecology

Community ecology is a subdiscipline of ecology which studies the distribution, abundance, demography, and biological interactions between coexisting populations....
—the study of groups of organisms in relation to the environment—or community ecology. Odum (1959, p. 8) considered that synecology should be divided into population ecology, community ecology, and ecosystem ecology, defining autecology as essentially "species ecology." However, for some time biologists have recognized that the more significant level of organization of a species is a population, because at this level the species gene pool is most coherent. In fact, Odum regarded "autecology" as no longer a "present tendency" in ecology (i.e., an archaic term), although included "species ecology"—studies emphasizing life history
Life history

The term life history has been given many meanings in several scientific fields. It can refer to a variety of methods and techniques that are used for conducting qualitative research interviews, especially in the fields of sociology and anthropology....
 and behavior as adaptations to the environment of individual organisms or species—as one of four sub-divisions of ecology.

The development of the field of population ecology owes much to the science of demography
Demography

Demography is the statistical study of all populations. It can be a very general science that can be applied to any kind of dynamic population, that is, one that changes over time or space ....
 and the use of actuarial
Actuary

An actuary is a business professional who deals with the financial impact of risk and uncertainty. Actuaries have a deep understanding of financial security systems, their reasons for being, their complexity, their mathematics, and the way they work ....
 life table
Life table

In actuarial science, a life table is a table which shows, for a person at each age, what the probability is that they die before their next birthday....
s. Population ecology has also played an important role in the development of the field of conservation biology
Conservation biology

Conservation biology is the scientific study of the nature and status of Earth's biodiversity with the aim of protecting species, their habitats, and ecosystems from excessive rates of extinction....
 especially in the development of population viability analysis
Population viability analysis

Population viability analysis is a species-specific method of risk assessment frequently used in conservation biology. It is traditionally defined as the process that determines the probability that a population will go extinct within a given number of years....
 (PVA) which makes it possible to predict the long-term probability of a species persisting in a given habitat patch (e.g., a national park).

While essentially a subfield of biology
Biology

Biology is a branch of the natural sciences concerned with the study of living organisms and their interaction with each other and their environment ....
, population ecology provides many interesting problems for mathematicians
Mathematics

Mathematics is the study of quantity, structure, space, change, and related topics of pattern and form. Mathematicians seek out patterns whether found in numbers, space, natural science, computers, imaginary abstractions, or elsewhere....
 and statisticians
Statistics

Statistics is a Mathematics pertaining to the collection, analysis, interpretation or explanation, and presentation of data. It also provides tools for prediction and forecasting based on data....
, which work mainly in the study of population dynamics
Population dynamics

Population dynamics is the branch of life sciences that studies short- and long-term changes in the size and age composition of populations, and the biology and environment processes influencing those changes....
.

Scientific literature

Scientific literature on population ecology can be found in The Journal of Animal Ecology, Oikos
Oikos (journal)

Oikos is a monthly scientific journal published by the Nordic Society Oikos in the field of ecology.Oikos is published in collaboration with Ecography , Lindbergia, the Journal of Avian Biology, and with the monograph series Ecological Bulletins....
 and other journals.

See also

  • Density-dependent inhibition
  • Genetic variation
  • Irruptive growth
    Irruptive growth

    Irruptive growth, sometimes called Malthusian growth, is a growth pattern defined by Overpopulation and subsequent sharp population crashes, or diebacks....
  • Life table
    Life table

    In actuarial science, a life table is a table which shows, for a person at each age, what the probability is that they die before their next birthday....
  • Malthusian growth model
    Malthusian growth model

    The Malthusian growth model, sometimes called the simple exponential growth model, is essentially exponential growth based on a constant rate of compound interest....
  • Metapopulation
    Metapopulation

    A metapopulation consists of a group of spatially separated populations of the same species which interact at some level. The term metapopulation was coined by Richard Levins in 1969 to describe a model of population dynamics of insect pests in agricultural fields, but the idea has been most broadly applied to species in naturally or artifici...
  • Population density
    Population density

    Population density is a measurement of population per unit area or unit volume. It is frequently applied to living organisms, and particularly to humans....
  • Population distribution
  • Population dynamics
    Population dynamics

    Population dynamics is the branch of life sciences that studies short- and long-term changes in the size and age composition of populations, and the biology and environment processes influencing those changes....
     and population growth
    Population growth

    Population growth is the change in population over time, and can be quantified as the change in the number of individuals in a population using "per unit time" for measurement....
  • Population genetics
    Population genetics

    Population genetics is the study of the allele frequency distribution and change under the influence of the four evolutionary processes: natural selection, genetic drift, mutation and gene flow....
  • Population size
    Population size

    In population genetics and population ecology, population size is the number of individual organisms in a population.The effective population size is defined as "the number of breeding individuals in an idealized population that would show the same amount of dispersion of allele frequencies under random genetic drift or the same amount of...
  • Important publications in autecology
  • Reproduction


Bibliography