AP Biology Period 2 #WongNation

Written by Devansh Taori .              The world is in an era of gross ecological overshoot. Because of industrialization, capitalism, growth, and consumption, humans have been polluting the environment and using up resources to such an extent that many species are in critical danger. If continued, this process will eventually result in the sixth mass extinction.               This is the story of The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History , a scientific non-fiction book by award-winning author Elizabeth Kolbert. She breaks up the book into 13 chapters, each analyzing a different ecosystem or species. Through an empirical analysis of scientific trends, Kolbert successfully makes the argument that the world is on the brink of overshooting its capacity, causing many animals to die off. She proves her point by pointing to statistics such as the extinction rate for amphibians increasing to 45,000 times the normal and resource consumption productivity declining by a factor of 1

Written by Devansh Taori.              As I sat down to read Chapter 3 of Campbell Biology, I held a glass of water in my hand. Reading more and more about water’s versatile qualities, I suddenly realized that water is an essential component of all life on Earth. It not only quenches my thirst and brings me satisfaction, but it also sustains my existence. Like a diamond, water truly is a one-and-only, unique compound.               Water has four main qualities that make it extremely versatile.                The first is cohesion. Because of its molecular structure, water has a cohesive capacity, where hydrogen bonding helps keep individual molecules close together. This effectively allows it to not only travel upward in plants, but also produce a surface tension that helps insects remain afloat.                The second is a high specific heat. Because a lot of heat has to be absorbed in order to break hydrogen bonds, water can moderate temperature extremely well