SubjectsSubjects(version: 964)
Course, academic year 2024/2025
   Login via CAS
General Ecology - MB160P08
Title: Ekologie obecná
Czech title: Ekologie obecná
Guaranteed by: Department of Ecology (31-162)
Faculty: Faculty of Science
Actual: from 2022
Semester: winter
E-Credits: 5
Examination process: winter s.:
Hours per week, examination: winter s.:3/0, Ex [HT]
Capacity: unlimited
Min. number of students: unlimited
4EU+: no
Virtual mobility / capacity: no
State of the course: taught
Language: Czech
Explanation: od 2022/23 pouze v ZS, v LS je MB162P47 v angličtině
Additional information: http://web.natur.cuni.cz/ekologie/vyuka/Obecna_ekologie/
Note: enabled for web enrollment
Guarantor: RNDr. Martin Černý, Ph.D.
Teacher(s): RNDr. Martin Černý, Ph.D.
Incompatibility : MB162P47, MB170P75
Is incompatible with: MB162P19, MB162P47, MB170P75
Annotation -
Starting from 2019/20, the lecture will be available both in winter and summer semester. In winter semester, the lecture will be given in Czech language, in summer semester in English. The language of oral exam for both semesters is upon your choice, ie. either in Czech or in English.

Lecture provides fundamentals of ecology as scientific discipline, and it is aimed primarily to bachelor grade with basic knowledge of botany, zoology and chemistry. The lecture focuses primarily on the very subject of ecology, i.e. interactions between an organism and its habitat and on interactions among organisms themselves. Environmental protection and conservation issues and other human-biased aspects of ecology are intentionally omitted. The lecture is structured from autecology (an individual x habitat) to dynamics of interaction within and among populations (particularly on competition and predation incl. basic models) to community and ecosystem specifics. Among numerous textbooks the classics by Begon, M., Harper, J. L. & Townsend, C. R. 1996 Ecology. (3rd ed , Blackwell Science, Oxford) is recommended though other (i.e. Colinvaux 1993 Ecology 2., Krebs 1994 Ecology, Ricklefs 1990 Ecology) are very good indeed.
Last update: Černý Martin, RNDr., Ph.D. (24.02.2019)
Literature -

Smith & Smith Elements of Ecology, 9th ed

Townsend , Begon, Harper - Základy ekologie, 2010 (in Czech) 

Begon, M., Townsend, C. R. 2021 Ecology. 5th ed , Wiley Blackwell 

Colinvaux 1993 Ecology 2.

Last update: Černý Martin, RNDr., Ph.D. (06.10.2021)
Requirements to the exam -

Oral or written exam either in Czech or in English, exam language is up to your choice.

Last update: Sacherová Veronika, RNDr., Ph.D. (08.04.2022)
Syllabus -

The complete lecture is available as a MS PowerPoint presentation (in Czech):

http://www.natur.cuni.cz/cerny/ekologie.html

1. Introduction, subject of ecology as scientific discipline, relations to conservative biology and applied environmental ecology, historical background.

2. Effects of environmental abiotic factors on an organism. Adaptations, tolerance, ecological niche, unitary and modular organisms.

3. Population characteristics and attributes, basic concepts of population dynamics.

4. Intrapopulation (density dependent) interactions, competition within population, asymmetry in competition, compensation in competition. Territorial behavior, self-thinnig in modular organisms, constant yield rule. "Negative" competition (Allee effect).

5. Basic mathematical models of intrapopulation competition: concepts, prerequisites, biological interpretations. Population numbers fluctuations in time.

6. Molecular ecology: population ecology on the genotype level (drift, inbreeding, migration).

7. Interpopulation (between species) interactions. Overview, characteristics.

8. Interpopulation competition. Principle of competitive exclusion, character shift. Co-existence of competitors. Overview of basic models: Lotka-Volterra, Tilmann

9. Predation: co-evolution of predator and prey, specialization of predator. Predator's Functional response to prey density. Refugee. Concepts and overview of basic predation models (Lotka-Volterra, host-parasitiod, grazer-plants).

10. Mutualism

11. Detritovory, saprophytic organisms

12. Life strategies, r and K, vital attributes, reproduction costs.

13. Community: concepts, attributes, structure

14. Species richness and diversity, how to measure it, what rules the diversity.

15. Ecological succession. Metapopulation and island ecology concepts.

16. Stability of communities/ecosystems. Differences between terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems.

17. Energy flow in biosphere. Nutrients and other basic substances, availability, global cycles.

Last update: VSACH (25.04.2002)
 
Charles University | Information system of Charles University | http://www.cuni.cz/UKEN-329.html