Carbon Cycle And Its Effect On Earth

The Carbon Cycle is a process necessary to all life forms as carbon is used for photosynthesis, cellular respiration, and is found in all living organisms. This process occurs naturally from cellular respiration, decomposition, and volcanic eruptions. However from burning fossil fuels and cutting down trees at a rapid pace carbon dioxide is being released into the atmosphere at an artificial rate. The overabundance of atmospheric carbon dioxide is causing for global warming. This global warming is causing extreme havoc to the Earth and all of its life forms. However this damage, although cannot be reversed, can be changed for the better.

When trees are burned, CO2 is relinquished. The burning of astronomically immense areas of trees is known as deforestation. Human activities integrate more CO2 into the atmosphere through activities like the burning of fossil fuels. The guiding question of this investigation is, “Which carbon cycle process affects atmospheric carbon the most?” The researchers initially wanted to learn 2 things. First, the researchers wanted to learn how much carbon engenderment there would be if they incremented the amount of fossil fuels burnt by a certain amount. The researchers also wanted to learn how much carbon engenderment there would be if they incremented the amount of deforestation.

According to our biology book, “there are several elements (water, oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus) that cycle through our world just like energy is cycled. These elements are never created or destroyed, but instead they are constantly recycled and reused.” Various human activities can hamper/benefit these cycles. Two of the cycles and how they are benefited and adversely affected by human activities are explained below.

*Nitrogen is circulated in a biogeochemical cycle and is a necessary element in the structure of living things.

You can identify a long-trend in the data provided by Globalview because it provides you with different sources and data from different areas around the world. Humans have increased the release of CO2 by like cement production, deforestation, and burning fossil fuels.

The nitrogen cycle is extremely important. This is because of the importance of nitrogen itself. Nitrogen is a basic element of life. It also makes up 78 percent of the Earth's atmosphere. It forms an essential part of amino acids (which make up proteins) and DNA. Nitrogen is essential for all living cells.

The Carbon Cycle is an important key to maintaining all the life on earth alive. The Carbon Cycle happens between all living things, so they all play a major role in it. It is the second most abundant element that makes up living things. Carbon affects the atmosphere throughout the years because the carbon has to travel to and from the living things.

The carbon cycle occurs when organism release carbon through respiration, or when decomposers, a type of heterotroph, release carbon from dead organisms as they break them down. This released carbon then circles through the environment and the atmosphere to be used in other earthly processes. The nitrogen cycle is aided and used by both autotrophs and heterotrophs. Autotrophs use the nitrogen cycle to make nucleic acids from nitrates and nitrites. Heterotrophs use the nitrogen cycle when consumers eat producers (autotrophs) and reuse their nitrogen. Heterotrophs also aid the nitrogen cycle because decomposers release nitrogen from dead organisms. The nitrogen cycle passes nitrogen through the soil, organisms, and air, through the use of feeding styles as well as other processes. Energy in food chains is another type of natural cycle. Organisms use energy on respiration which is a process involving food. Consumers also take part in the energy in food chain cycle when they take energy from other organisms they eat. These cycles are a large part of the biological “circle of

Nutrients are very important to the life of many species, and are continuously cycled through the biogeochemical cycles with the help of plants and animals. Nitrogen is a required nutrient in plants because it is needed for chlorophyll and DNA (Aber 1992). Phosphorus gives energy to animals. Working in unison the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles move nutrients throughout soil into plants, microbes, and animals, and then back into the soil once the animals die (Pellerin 2006). The carbon cycle plays a critical role in forest watersheds, because it makes up all organisms, such as bacteria and humans. The carbon cycle aids in photosynthesis, which is very important to plants in a watershed. The carbon and oxygen cycles work in unison during photosynthesis and in the decomposition of plants. When working in harmony the

1) During Photosynthesis plants use sunlight to make energy and later use that energy to make glucose by taking in CO2. So it takes in Carbon from the atmosphere and stores it as sugar. Cellular Respiration is using that sugar to make ATP. In this process CO2 is released. These two processes contribute to the Carbon cycle because one takes in the CO2 and the other releases CO2. They are like the converters of the cycle.

Carbon is an important part of all living things on earth. The carbon cycle is a way for nature to recycle and store this important element. The carbon cycle works when

The world continuously faces a variety of threats every day, from natural disasters to terrorist, but one threat that society predominately contributes to all on their own, is climate change. There are many feasible explanations for the global threat of climate change. These explanations include but are not limited to, the act of deforestation to the rainforest and other trees, green house gas emissions, and sulfate aerosol, which cause poor air quality.

It is a recorded fact that the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere today is at the highest level ever recorded or studied. The large number of invasive carbon dioxide molecules is causing detrimental problems in the environment. This gas is linked to the Earth’s drastically rising temperatures, causing the rising sea level and thousands of arctic animals to lose their homes. This is an unignorable problem that needs great minds who are passionate and determined in this field. The most substantial problems mankind has faced were solved by hard working and dedicated scientists. The inevitable problems caused by the huge carbon dioxide concentration is a problem that can be solved in the same way. I believe that by gaining knowledge in this field it would give me the ability to create a way to reverse the carbon cycle, by developing a synthetic plant of sorts. By doing this, not only could the greenhouse effect be prevented from further damaging the environment, but we may also keep the amount of Carbon Dioxide in the air to a minimum. I hope to be a lot like the great scientists of this earth due to my determined and passionate nature, and with the right schooling and research I would like to be a part of the research to try and solve this critical problem.

1. One sustainability issue would be that growing one type of food species can disrupt the natural carbon cycle. Like in the biosphere 2 where the residents ended up growing just sweet potatoes, it is thought that the sweet potatoes and the plants in the area disrupted the carbon cycle and this ended up overpowering the atmosphere dropping the Biosphere oxygen levels from 21% to 14%. This does not create a sustainable environment. Another problem would be biodiversity, and the lack of different plant species. The more diversity there is in terms of plant species, the more resilient they become. Since there wouldn’t be very many plants on Mars, the plants would be prone to harm that would ruin its sustainability. Reduced diet diversity will be a challenge while astro-farming on Martian soil. To keep the area small and combat this issue, an efficient Mars diet should be strictly vegan and will not include fruits or nuts from trees.

The world?s degraded soils (1216 Mha) and agricultural soils (4961 Mha) both have high potential for C sequestration. Historical data shows that there were 40 Pg of SOC lost in these soils. Considering these soils have capability to sequester C, it is important to realized that the there is a way to reverse the SOC depletion process. Based on Table 2.1, the total potential of soil C sequestration is around 0.6 to 1.2 Pg C/ year, in which the world cropland could sequester C at the rate of 0.4 to 0.6 Pg C/ year (Lal, 2000) and the desertification control has the C sequestration potential around 0.2 to 0.6 Pg C/year. Conant et al., (2001) pointed out that the grassland also has relative high potential of C sequestration, which can be included in desertification control. These data implies that with 50 years accumulative sink (30-60