Topic: Biodiversity

Botany

Top­ic: Bio­di­ver­si­ty

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Intro­duc­tion:

• If an alien were to vis­it Earth, the first thing that would amaze him is the enor­mous diver­si­ty of life on the plan­et.
• Even humans find it aston­ish­ing and fas­ci­nat­ing that there are so many liv­ing organ­isms.
• Exam­ples of the stag­ger­ing vari­ety:
  • More than 20,000 species of ants
  • 3,00,000 species of bee­tles
  • 28,000 species of fish­es
  • Near­ly 20,000 species of orchids
• Ecol­o­gists and evo­lu­tion­ary biol­o­gists seek to under­stand this diver­si­ty by ask­ing sev­er­al impor­tant ques­tions:
  • Why are there so many species?
  • Did such diver­si­ty exist through­out Earth­’s his­to­ry?
  • How did this diver­si­fi­ca­tion hap­pen?
  • Why is this diver­si­ty impor­tant to the bios­phere?
  • Would the bios­phere func­tion dif­fer­ent­ly with less diver­si­ty?
  • How do humans ben­e­fit from this diver­si­ty?

13.1 Biodiversity

Def­i­n­i­tion:

• Bio­di­ver­si­ty refers to the com­bined diver­si­ty at all lev­els of bio­log­i­cal orga­ni­za­tion, from macro­mol­e­cules with­in cells to entire bio­mes.
• The term was pop­u­lar­ized by socio­bi­ol­o­gist Edward Wil­son.

Types of Bio­di­ver­si­ty:

1. Genet­ic Diver­si­ty:
   • Refers to the vari­ety of genes with­in a species.
   • Exam­ple: The med­i­c­i­nal plant Rau­wolfia vom­i­to­ria in dif­fer­ent Himalayan ranges shows genet­ic diver­si­ty in the poten­cy and con­cen­tra­tion of the chem­i­cal reser­pine it pro­duces.
   • In India, there are more than 50,000 genet­i­cal­ly dif­fer­ent strains of rice and 1,000 vari­eties of man­go.
2. Species Diver­si­ty:
   • Refers to the vari­ety of species in a giv­en area.
   • Exam­ple: The West­ern Ghats have a greater diver­si­ty of amphib­ian species than the East­ern Ghats.
3. Eco­log­i­cal Diver­si­ty:
   • Refers to the vari­ety of ecosys­tems in a region.
   • Exam­ple: India has greater ecosys­tem diver­si­ty than Nor­way with its deserts, rain forests, man­groves, coral reefs, wet­lands, estu­ar­ies, and alpine mead­ows.

Impor­tance of Bio­di­ver­si­ty:

• The bio­di­ver­si­ty we see today has tak­en mil­lions of years of evo­lu­tion to accu­mu­late.
• How­ev­er, this wealth could be lost in less than two cen­turies if species con­tin­ue to dis­ap­pear at the cur­rent rate.

Con­ser­va­tion of Bio­di­ver­si­ty:

• Bio­di­ver­si­ty con­ser­va­tion has become a vital envi­ron­men­tal issue of inter­na­tion­al con­cern.
• More peo­ple are real­iz­ing the crit­i­cal impor­tance of bio­di­ver­si­ty for human sur­vival and well-being on Earth.

Sum­ma­ry:

• Bio­di­ver­si­ty is a cru­cial aspect of life on Earth, with diverse species, genet­ics, and ecosys­tems con­tribut­ing to the sta­bil­i­ty and health of the plan­et.
• Loss of bio­di­ver­si­ty could have severe con­se­quences, mak­ing its con­ser­va­tion essen­tial for the future.