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Maintaining biodiversity

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In your own words. Please explain:

What is biodiversity?
What are some of the most biodiverse ecosystems on the globe and how are humans impacting it?
Is maintaining biodiversity essential for human sustainability?
What can be done to maintain today's current biodiversity levels?
What are invasive species and how do they impact biodiversity?

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Solution Summary

Impact of human populations on biodiversity and vice versa; discussion of invasive species

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Biodiversity is a measure of how many lifeforms inhabit a specific area. The greater the number of species, the more biodiverse a region is said to be. Some of the most biodiverse areas are Amazon rainforests and coral reefs. See http://audubonmagazine.org/biodiversity.html

Humans are rapidly destroying rainforest, due to demand for grazing land and oil. For more on the development of oil fields, see http://news.mongabay.com/2008/0812-oil_amazon.html. Coral reefs are also in decline largely due to the death of the coral itself. This may be a result of rising pH levels in the ocean's waters, which in turn is caused by increasing carbon dioxide levels. This is the result of human use of fossil fuels.

Besides using fossil fuels, other human ...

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