The Carbon Cycle | The Oxygen Cycle | The Hydrologic Cycle | The Cycles and Climate | Coupled Cycles |
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Rules:
Now, we need a volunteer to start things off.
This carbon compound contains the
majority of atmospheric carbon.
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What is carbon dioxide?
This atmospheric carbon source is
primarily anthropogenic and amounts to an influx of about 6 Gt/yr.
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What is combustion?
This atmospheric carbon sink results
from an endothermic reaction involving water.
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What is photosynthesis?
This slowly occurring carbon reaction
is believed to be the carbon sink which caused climate to gradually warm
during the uplift of the Himalayas beginning 65 million years ago.
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What is carbonate or silicate weathering?
This oxygen source is a chemical reaction
that occurs on a rapid time scale and depletes atmospheric carbon.
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What is photosynthesis?
The element is tightly coupled to the
oxygen cycle and its atmospheric amount is inversely related to that of
free oxygen.
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What is carbon?
This source of atmospheric oxygen was
instrumental (according to the text) in allowing life to exist on the early
Earth.
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What is photodissociation of water?
This source of atmospheric oxygen
results in a net emission of oxygen to the atmosphere of 0.13 Gt per year
and involves the creation of sediments by life.
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What is organic carbon burial?
This process describes the flux of
water vapor through the membranes of plants and trees.
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What is (evapo-)transpiration?
This process involves the condensation
of water vapor and acts as a significant heat source for the atmosphere.
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What is precipitation?
This is a measure of atmospheric thermodynamic
instability that depends strongly on near surface air temperature and humidity.
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What is CAPE?
These are the levels at which an atmospheric
"parcel", if lifted adiabatically, will first become saturated and then
become positively buoyant.
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What are the lifting condensation level and level
of free convection?
One would expect this change in global
surface temperature if respiration were to increase and the atmosphere
were to accumulate CO2.
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What is an increase in temperature?
This component of the hydrologic cycle
is responsible for a large portion of the cooling at the Earth's surface.
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What is evaporation?
This chemical compound can be used
as a proxy for oceanic CO2 concentration and is a component
of shells and skeletons.
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What is calcium carbonate?
One would expect this change in global
surface temperature due to an uplift of mountain ranges leading to an increase
in carbonate and silicate weathering.
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What is a global cooling?
This cycle, in enhanced, will contribute
to greater atmospheric heating.
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What is the hydrologic cycle?
If the atmospheric hydrologic cycle
were to increase, this process would be enhanced and contribute to cooler
global surface temperatures.
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What is dissolution of carbon dioxide?
If the hydrologic cycle were enhanced
and storms were to extend deeper into the troposphere, the abundance of
this molecule in the stratosphere would increase.
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What is ozone or water vapor?
This process contributes bicarbonate
ions to the upper ocean and is not directly related to the amount of atmospheric
carbon dioxide.
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What is oceanic upwelling?