Grant Lahring December 16 (3/3)

What We Did:
- Went over notes on the blood types
- Reviewed blood types and blood clotting
- Learned how certain deficiencys can lead to hemophilia
Thoughts and Opinions:
- Probably the most practical thing we'll ever learn in biology
- I should find out my own blood type (Considering donating blood, heard rumors of doughnuts)
- Kind of of that O type blood, with no antigen, is universally accepted, it seems although the body would more likely attack something with no antigen than something with, say, 1 of 2 antigens. If having no antigens means univseral acceptance, why don't virus' have no antigens?
Above and Beyond:
- Sorry, internet is glitching again, can't get a picture (Cuuuuuuuuuurrrrrrrrsssssssseeeeeeee you dial-up)
- My blood type is type O, negative, the universal donor, so I will donate blood after all ^_^
- The human human heart can squirt blood up to 30-feet. Wow.

Codee Koch,Tue December 15, Blog #3 3/3

What We Did
- A recap of pg 372 d, e, f, g
-filled in and read the blood clotting handout
-reviewed blood typing
-reviewed the immune system

Thoughts and Opinions
-at first the blood typing was confusing but eventually it became easier to understand
-the system of blood clotting was pretty easy ( the definitions and how blood clotting works, fibrinogen, prothrombin, etc...)

Above and Beyond
-below is a picture of certain blood types

Bree Harrison (December 10th, 2009)

What we did:
-Handed in ticket to the test pg.346 #1-5,7-9,11,13,14,18
-Chapter 10 quiz.
-Dissection questions due tomorrow.

My thoughts:
-I found it interesting that the pulmonary circulatory system is the system of blood vessels that carries blood to and from the lungs.
I also found it different that the right and left side of the heart are different from when you compare them in your chest. This is confusing because you mix up the sides on test questions.

Above and Beyond:

This link shows cardiac output which was a key point in chapter 10.

Rebecca Eddy (Wednesday December 8, 2009)

What we did:

• Marked the homework from Tuesday and then handed it in (blood flow from capillaries back to capillaries in reverse).
• Went through page 320.
• Learned about heart sounds.
• Learned about heart beats and took notes on them.
• SA and AV nodes. 
• Gave us the pig dissection sheet for Wednesday.

Key Definitions:

• Myogenic muscle: Muscle that contracts due to nerves within the tissue.
• Node: Cluster of nerves.
• SA and AV nodes: The SA node acts as a pacemaker and is located in the upper right atrium. The AV node acts as the conductor and they both send nerve impulses. The SA node activates the AV node.
• Purkinje fibres: Fibres coming from the AV node to the bottom of the ventricles and then branch upwards. 
• Systole: Pressure in circulatory system due to ventricle contraction.
• Diastole: Blood pressure in circulatory system due to relaxed ventricles.
• "Lubb": The sound that the closing of AV valves makes. It is louder than "dubb".
• "Dubb": The sound that the closing of semilunar valves makes.

Thoughts and Opinions:

I think that there was alot of definitions to take in. After studying a bit though, it was pretty easy to understand. I think the most difficult part to understand was the SA and AV nodes.  

Above and Beyond:

    
This is a picture of the heart that shows you where the AV and SA nodes are. It also shows you the way the nerve impulses go.

Shannon Eslinger (Dissection Day!)

The Plan For Today:

Recap:

-purkinje fibres

-hearbeat
     -pace maker?
-heart sounds? Lub dub

Purkinje Fibres: a nerve fibre that branches and carries electrical impulses throught the ventricles

The normal heart sound is typically described as "lub-dub." The "lub" sound is usually softer and longer than the "dub", and it is associated with the closing of the A-V valves at the beginning of systole. The sounds are also amplified by the chest, making them more audible. The sounds of the heart are only from the valves closing, not opening. The "lub" is the first heart sound. The "dub" sound is shorter and louder than the "lub" sound. It is associated with the closing of semilunar valves (aortic and pulmonary). The sound is shorter and louder because the cusps of the valves are more rigid than the mtral and tricuspid valves. - http://library.thinkquest.org/C003758/Function/Sounds.htm

1) Dissection

     -overview

     -safety (goggles and gloves)

     -group of three

     -clean up

2) Chapter 10 Test (However we didn't get to that part so study up for tonight) The test will be on Dec 9, 2009 (Thursday) and the ticket is due as well (Pg.346-347 #1-5, 7 , 9-11, 13, 14, 17, 18)

Thoughts/Opinions

The pig heart dissection was amazing.. stinky... but amazing. It involved a lot of snipping and slicing away at membrances and fat. We got to take a look at where the valves were and the arteries and the ventricles. It was double Bio today so we dissected in both blocks. Yeah, right before lunch, just wonderful! But overall it was a pretty sweet class that flew by... unlike other bio classes :) just jokes.

Above and Beyond

This is actually a picture of a human heart but it is similar to a pig's heart. As you can see there are the valves and whatnot which I think we should have seen but they were sort of tricky. For those who missed this class, I feel sorry for you...you missed a great class.

Cordel Evans wednesday class.

Class review: We talked about the heart beat on wednesday. He explaind some terms concerning the heart beat. Miogenic muscle witch is muscle that contracts due to nerves with in the tissue buy its self. The nerves in a heart help the muscles contract. He also talked about SA nodes and AV nodes. SA and AV nodes send a nerve message to the tissue of the heart telling it to contract and relax. SA sends to atruim and AV sends to Ventricular. We also talked about purkingi fibers that exept the message from the nerves. Systole means preasure in the circulatory system due to ventricular contractions. Distole means presure due to relaxed vventricles.

some aditional questions are how the SA and AV nodes are developed through embriology? An opinion is that we should go through the material more slower so we get a beder understanding.

Tiffany Courchesne December 2nd 2009 (second)

What We Did

- Test about digestion

Thoughts/Opinions

-The test was rather difficult
- It was hard to know all of the function of the secretins ( tripsin, erepsin, pepsin etc...)
- The whole thing went very fast. ( i am guessing its to get us ready for next year)

Above and Beyond

This is a more complex look at the digestive system this tells me that there is a lot more that we could have learned. like the transvers colon, the hepatic flexure and many more

Kyla Stevenson, November 25, 2009

~Review of the class~

1) Protein catalysts

2)Catalyst: Speeds up or slows down the rate of the reaction.

3)Enzyme Action:
     -Substrates-molecules to bond
     -Enzyme-protein that facilitates bonding between substrates.
     -Enzymes are NOT changed, so they can facilitate many substrate bondings

4)The effect of enzymes on activation energy: The enzyme reduces the activation energy required for substrate bonding.

~Thoughts/Opinions~

-It was actually interesting to start learning about the digestion system, it's important to learn about and have an understanding of how it's important to be healthy.

~Above and Beyond~

-The link below demonstrates the effect of enzymes on activation energy using a graph:
http://scholar.hw.ac.uk/site/biology/activity4.asp

Lexie Nylund, November Double Bio monday 16th

What we Learned

• Read and understand lab pg 195
• Pigment Lab
• Looked at notes he gave us (photosynthesis notes)

What we looked at

 

• The cycles of photosynthesis
• Calvin benson cycle
• The phases of the calvin benson cycle

 

What i thought

 

• I thought the photosynthesis was one of the hardest unites and should of had more time.
• The cycles were interesting to see how the calvin cyle and how everything fit in place and how it goes into G3P into glucose to starch and sucrose

 

Above and Beyond

 

• The Calvin-Benson cycle can be constructed step by step. To do so, the required energetic or reduction quivalents (ATP or NADPH) must be dragged to the reaction vector and the correct enzymes for the next reaction step must be chosen.

•  Phase 1: carbon fixation
• Phase 2: reduction
• Phase 3: Regeneration of CO2 acceptor (RuBP)

November 24th. Stephen Carrier 2/3

What We Did Today - Hand in homework (Introduction questions to new unit)
- Did notes on Carbohydrates, Lipids & Protiens
- Learned about Hydrolisis.  (Breaking Down Carbohydrates Using Water.

My Thoughts On The Class
- I thought that most of the stuff we did in class a review from Science 10. For instance we learned that proteins were composed of amino acids last year.  Some new stuff to me was learning about Hydrolisis and Dehydration Synthesis.  Though the learning about trans fats was interesting because I have always wondered what wascausing all the fuss with food companies and people when they are buying food.  Also learning about metabolism was informative as people always talk about it but never really explain what it actually is, I intrigued by that part of our class.

Taylor Plemel (November 16, 2009)

What We Did That Day 3/3
- went over the products of the Calvin Cycle
- learned that PGAL is the same as G3P
- learned the 3 phases of the Calvin Cylce: Carbon Fixation, Reduction, Regeneration of CO2 Acceptor
- learned that G3P is used to make carbohydrates such a glucose

My Thoughts On The Class
- the Calvin Cycle is pretty complex and a really important part of photosynthesis
- it's interesting that one cycle requires light while the other one can continue without
- in my opinion, it might have been easier for me to learn about photosynthesis if we'd learned about it first
  instead of cellular respiration

Above And Beyond

- above, a diagram of CR

- above, a diagram of photosynthesis

- put these two above diagrams together and you have the two most important cycles in life

- here is a link explaining about G3P and the other names it can go by: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G3P

Grant Lahring, Friday, November 12, 2009 (3/3)

What We Did Today

• Wrote cellular respiration test
• Went over notes on photosynthesis
• Learned about photosystems and the electromagnetic spectrum
• Reviewed chloroplasts from grade 10

My Thoughts

• I learned a lot about photosythesis, which part of the reaction requires light, that there are two different photosystems on the thylakoid membrane and each absorbs a different wavelenght of light.
• Like cellular respiration, photosynthesis is really hard to learn solely through notes.
• That photosynthesis also produces ATP, in much the same way as CR. I thought PS was for making glucose for CR to burn, and I guess it is, but it makes some of it's own energy.

Above and Beyond

• One of the questions we began the year with was how does photosynthesis use light? In class we discussed that the light excites an electron to jump an energy level, but that seems like we have to take it on faith, as does a lot of these processes. The method we learn seems to ignore parts of the process (understandable, as they are hard enough as is)
• To remedy this lack of knowledge I went to my dad's old university textbook. After fifteen minutes of staring blankly at a page depicting chloropyll A I have decided ignorance is a lot simpler.
• I learned which energy levels each pigment in a leaf absorbs, which is as follows;

• Chlorophyll A - occurs in all green plants - Absorbs red and violet-blue light
• Chlorophyll B - Green plants, not red or blue-green algae - Absorbs red and violet-blue light
• Chlorophyll C - Brown algae and diatoms - Absorbs red and violet-blue light
• Chlorophyll D - Red algae - Absorbs red and violet-blue light
• Protochlorophyll - Etiolated plants - Near red and blue-violet
• Bacteriochlophyll - Purple bacteria -   "       "     "      "  -  "
• Bacterioviridin - Green sulfur bacteria - "      "     "      "  -  "
• Phycocyanin - Blue green or red algae - Orange red
• Phycoerythrin - Blue green or red algae - Green
• Carotenoids - Most plants, bacteria - Blue, blue-green

Sorry, I can't get a picture for this entry because I'm on dial-up and something is wrong with my computer (random freezes and resets, etc)

Codee Koch Mon Nov 9, 2009 3/3

What we did today:
-Watched a DVD called Energy In/Out
-Practiced questions-independently, on pg 232 # 1-18 for practice on our quiz which is on thursday (ticket to test)
-looked for you tube videos demonstrating cellular respiration

My Thoughts on the Material:
- it was mainly just review, so it was fairly easy to understand
-we also have pg's 222#1-3, 226 #6 and the questions Creatine Phosphate, what is it and how does it relate to CR. How does H2S and cyanide affect CR, How might TUMS help an athelete? due tommorow
- the movie was pretty much just review on CR, the stages and what allows a plant to create CR

Above and Beyond:

- here is a very simple diagram of Cellular respiration incase your still are not getting it
- the stages of Cellular Respiration are

1. Glycolosis- occurs in the cytoplasm
2. Puruvate oxidation-occurs in the mitochondrial matrix
3. Kreb's Cycle-occurs in the mitochondrial matrix
4. Electron Transport Chain-occurs in the inner membrane

Dale Day November 9/ 2009 2/3

in the first block  we did a quiz on celular respiration that I though t was ok but I would have liked to learn the percentage of ATP created through aerobic and anaerobic systems.
In the second block  we did an experiment. it was about trying to show the Electron Transport chain. I think that it was a little confusing even with mrs.Foot's help. Next time I think that Mr. Challoner should be here when we do the next experiment on Cellular Respiration.

Tuesday, November 3, 2009 DOUBLE BIO!

Todays Blog By Shannon Eslinger
 
Reminders:
-Don't forget blog
-Cellular Respiration Quiz Thursday, November 5, 2009
-Cellular Respiration Test on Friday
-Cellular Respiration Test Tuesday, November 10, 2009
-U2 Tests

What we did today:
 1) Recap
-Mark unit exam (hand in ticket to the test: Perception Sheets)
- 4 stages of cellular respiration/ location
- Oxidation/ Reduction/ Phosphoylation... the last one was really messy on the board so it was hard to copy
- "NADH has reducing power" (what does this mean?)

**Don't forget to pick up the hand-outs that you have missed**

2) Sources of Energy for Cellular Respiration

3) ATP

4) Cellular Respiration Notes (which we finished)

My Thoughts of the MATERIAL

Well I thought that today was very difficult understanding all the different methods of learning NADH. It was the same material don't get me wrong but it was just repetitive. Kreb's Cycle is very easy everyone! It is just the over-all method of going from glycolysis to pyruvate oxidation to Kreb's Cycle to Electron Transport Chain (ETC) was difficult.
Too many questions were asked today! Like what is the formula for cellular respiration... well we should all know that by now! C6 H12 O6 + 6O2 -----> 6CO2 + 6H20 + 36ATP
How does your body use proteins? Hormones, enzymes, structural components.
What do you need ATP for? Look at Pg.206 of the textbook at a very good diagram of the different uses of ATP!

Here is a sweet link about the tree man! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJLG85gn0bc

Here is a link about the same tree man but after surgery. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8v3VzEyp88&feature=related

Tony Dewane Wed Oct 28/09 3/3

What we did today
-two groups presented their nematode experiments
-we started our new unit

My thoughts on the material
-I thought the materialwas easy to understand as we did mostly reveiw of last years material
- if you wernt their we have to do page 202 questions 1 a-c 2 b-d 3 a+b
-we talked abourt photosynthesis and cellular respiration,we had tothink of 2 things we know and 2 things we didn't know about both

Above and beyond
one question that was brought up in class was were dose cellular respiration take place in a cell? Acording to
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Where_in_a_cell_dose_respiration_take_place it takes place in the mitochandrion.

What we did today:

- we presented our findings on nematodes
- watched the end of  "becoming humans"
- comoparing Teddy G's assignment to Darwins theory

My thoughts:

- I was thinking about what we watced in class today and it was saying that humans have the biggest brain in the phylogenetic tree and i wonder if this applies with all animals do humans have the biggest brain considering weare the smartest ?

- The assignment on Teddy G's was very interesting considering we got to eat at the same time but what does this really have to do with evolution.

- Something i learned in class was that scientist aren't 100% sure that we are decendants of neanderthals.

Above and Beyond :)

- Ifound out on this website : http://health.howstuffworks.com/10-brain-myths5.htm this tells me that the human brain is defenitly not the diggest which means size does not matter.

- I thoughtabout how Teddy G's could show us evolution and i figured out that this can show us how a certain species that has advantages can survive when the other becoms pray for most animals which causes them to go extinct and there is only left with the one species tht survived. The same with the Teddy G's we were the predators and we ate the happy teddy's at the end of this experiment we hade about 85% of our teddy's Sad and not happy which mans that extinction does happen and this is how some species all of a sudendisaper.

Kyla Stevenson (October 21,2009)

What we did Today: (Tuesday, October 20,2009)

-Reviewed Lamarks Theory
-Learned the concept of Allopatric Speciation
-Started talking about our new project on nematodes

My Thoughts:

-One new term i learned this class was Allopatric Speciation.

-It was also nice to do some reviewing on Lamark, and what he contributed to the theory of Evolution.

-Another new thing i learned in class was what a nematode is, the project seems like it's going to be exciting.

Above and Beyond:

-The link below shows a picture of what the nematode looks like:
http://www.ars-grin.gov/ars/SoAtlantic/fp/stpp/burelle/nematode.jpg

-Key Facts of Lamarks Theory:

• Environmental changes create new needs.
• Simple species come from Spontaneous Generation.
• Structures that aren't used diminish.
• Traits are passed on to offspring.
• The theory however is incorrect, traits are not passed on.
• The main contribution was: Evolution is adaptive, ad species change over time in response to environmental pressure.

Allopatric Speciation:  means new species being formed due to isolation.

-Three main points of Allopatric Speciation:

• Physical barrier separates populations in to two or more groups isolated from each other.
• Natural Selection.
• Accumilated physical and behavioural differences.

Class was good I'm not a fan of your pop quizes though. haha. Te maerial we covere was good I like the topic evolution. I find it interesting and neat. I find it wierd how everything may have evolved from one organism on earth to be thousands of different species. It's hard to believe that there is a theory that all the continents connected together to create Pangea. I am not finding much difficulty with this unit an I think it's because i'm interested in it. It's cool how you can see how closely animals are related using the DNA codes of the animals. It's hard to believe that animals can shange their traits over tme if they don't get used and they adapt to different environments.
I'm not sure where we are supposed to put the mark we think we should get but I thnk That's a 3 out of 3 for sure.

Taylor Plemel (October 15, 2009)

What We Accomplished Today: well, actually on Tuesday

- made progress in our ecosystem field study project
- put our information into tables, artfully designed by me
- made a play list on my iPod
- finished the climatogram
- classified some of the insects we trapped
- ate my lunch
- classified some vegetation


My Thoughts On The Class:


- I'm glad that Nils did the climatogram because I probably would have done it wrong and don't really understand the concept of it
- finding the height of the tree was easy since I'm so good at trig and it was a good reminder
- it would have been more beneficial to do this in the spring because we would have trapped more insects and seen more wildlife
- it would be interesting to see the finished products of the class next semester to see the differences between our projects


Above and Beyond:


- a climatogram is show variation in only two factors; temperature and precipitation. Although there are other factors that affect the climate, a climatogram does give a rough idea of the climate in a particular biome
- below is a picture of the wood ant resembling the one that we trapped and classified

- below again, is a picture of some moose I saw the other day

- also, just wondering if this fish is actually real or not

Taylor is awesome

Lexie Nylund Oct 14,2009

What We Did Today (Friday Oct 9,2009):


•We worked on our Ecosytem Field Study assignments


• Looked up what type of trees and insects we got





My Thoughts:


•Looking at the bugs on the microscope was pretty sweet.


•Thought it was hard to find what some of the insects are like one of the spiders.


•I think this project is pretty fun and should do more like this but with nicer weather.
 
• Think it cool learning more about our ecosystem.


Above and Beyond:


•Aspen Poplar



(Populus tremuloides)
Up to 30 m in height, bark at first smooth, greenish-white, becoming rough and dark grey with age, terminal bud is sharp and pointed, all buds dark brown.

• The Aspen tree is one of the most common in Alberta.

Jesse Morin october 13 3/3

What We Did Today:

• We worked on snake hill on our field study project.
• Then on the second class we worked on our field study project in the classroom.
• We checked for bugs that may have been caught overnight in the bugs traps that were set up.
• We measured temperatures.
• Thank you for the hot chocolate.

My Thoughts:

• The weather was bad for working on snake hill especially if you didn't dress well.
• Collecting the bugs was kind of cool just to see bugs that you may have never seen before.
• So far the project is going well, and hopefully we can do some more labs like this.
• The hot chocolate was nice to have in second block because it was so cold outside.

Above and Beyond:

• There are many spiders in alberta. One of the most common spiders in alberta is the wolf spider. They are most abundant betwen april and october. They are commonly found near lakes, rivers and forests. There are several kinds of wolf spiders usually ranging in colour from brown to black and can have deep blue markings. They can also grow to 2 inches in length.
• other spiders such as the ground spider and the grass spider are prominent in the fall months.

Grant L. Wednesday, October 8, 2009 3/3

What We Did Today:

• We went to Snake Hill to work on field study
• Perfromed basic tests (temperature, weather)
• Measured tree height using trigometry
• Calculated percentage of shade, grass and shrub coverage of the quadrant

My Thoughts:

• "Wow, it is way to cold for this."
• Calculating tree height was kind of interesting because it showed a real application of math. Plus I've always wondered how high the trees on Snake Hill and all around Sundre are.
• This field study is an interesting way to get a first hand perspective on what Biology really is, which is hard to see in a classroom reading a textbook.

Above And Beyond:

• I noticed that on Snake Hill, and in much of the Sundre area, trembling poplar are the dominant species. This is because trembling aspen are one of the few trees that spread by suckers from each other. This means that much of a forest (or growth to use proper terminology) is connected. This lets the trees live in areas other trees cannot due to poor soil or water because they can share nutrients and water. Also, trembling aspen are well adapted to short growing seasons as they can perform photosynthesis from their trunk, not just the leaves.
• I would suggest at least thinking about why plants and trees are where they are, you would be surprised at how well adapted they can be.
• You should know the difference between the circumferance of a tree and the diameter. How to make a triangle to calculate height of trees and what percent means.

Codee Koch, Mon. Oct 5,2009 3/3

What we did

• reviewed the Bio-20 Ecosystem Field Study Assingment
• reviewed and proceeded with the lab ''Examining water stratification''

My Thoughts

• After we finished the lab i found it very interesting that the salt water and fresh water cycled, but the warm and cold water did not.
• I found it even more interesting that because the salt water was more dense then the fresh water, that the salt water forced the fresh water up, there for cycling the mixture
• However I do question if there is an easier way of completeing this activity, because the removing of the laminated card from the two jars seemed to be somewhat difficult for some groups

Above and Beyond

• the photo below shows the layering of water and is a key element in the lab we did today
  

• 
  
  I would suggest knowing the terms in this photo along with  humus, litter, topsoil, subsoil, bedrock, biotic potential, and carrying capacity along with any others from chapter four (e.g limnetic zone, profundal zone, benthos, and latteral zone)
  
  
  

Bree Harrison, Wed. Sept. 30/09, 3/3

What we did

• Reviewed Biomes( specifically terrestrial ecosystems.)
• We marked our worksheet on Biomes handed out 2 days prior.
• Did review questions 6&7 on pg.100.
• Looked into factors affecting terrestrial ecosystems(main factors: Soil,temp.,sunlight, water available.)
• Notes on effects of seasons on lake and pond life.
• Did questions 2,3,4&7 on pg.107 due for Oct.1st

My thoughts

• I thought it was shocking that only 3% of the water on the planet is fresh water, and some of that isn't even available water(frozen in things such as glaciers.)
• When learning about the zones of water Mr.Challoner had tought us an acronym/key to help us study that i found interesting.    

                                   -Litter collect in the litterol zone.
                                   -Swim in limnetic zone.
                                   -No fun in profundal zone (because no light for plants).
                                   -Benthos=bottom layer.

•  Three new terms that I learned in class today are Stagnation which means low oxygen level and not recycling water. And the second word was epilimnion which is the upper layer of the lake. The final word was hypolimnion which is the bottom layer of water in a lake or pond.
• Another simple but interesting point that I learned today was that water doesn't evaporate as fast in cool temperatures.

Above and Beyond

 http://library.thinkquest.org/04oct/01590/intro/lake.jpg
The photo attached to this link is a diagram of the water zones that we learned in Biology today.

Review on some definitions:
Littoral Zone: Edge of pond of lake where water is shallow enough to permit the growth of rooted aquatic vegetation.
Limentic Zone:
-Open water.
-Light is present in this part(photosynthesis can occur)
-Phytoplankton
-Zooplankton
Profundal Zone: Region of lake where light cannot penetrate(no photosynthesis.)
Benthos: Bottom of any body of water.

Mr. C, - Mon, Sept 14th, 3/3

What we did today:

• reviewed from last week (E pyramids, laws of t'dynamics, trophic levels), and question 3a. on p32 (E flow calculations)
• introduced concept of biogeochemical cycles (2nd part of mantra)
  
• introduced "bottle biosphere" project (pairs, due Tues Sept 22nd)
• discussed H2O cycle and worked on water T/F Qs worksheet
• dodged having to prepare for food calorimetry lab tomorrow (Mr. C forgot photocopies)

Thoughts about material:
Our discussion made me wonder about the biodome project (why didn't it work?), if there are examples of food chains with more than 5 trophic levels, and just how thick is the biosphere (other than "saran wrap on a basketball"). It's hard to believe that this small region is the only place that life exists in the universe.

Above and Beyond:
According to this site: www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/biosphere the average thickness of the biosphere is about 5400m above sea level to 9000m below sea level. That's 14.4km - not very thick (you could walk that far in about an hour and a half!). Note: some organisms have been recorded outside of this range - at least temporarily e.g. Ruppels vulture found at 11,300m! (Mt Everest is 8850m) and some fish found at -8372m! (10,000psi of pressure!). Most organisms at the extremes of the biosphere are simple, single-celled bacteria.
NOTE: this section includes a website reference link, and is paraphrased in MY OWN WORDS.

The picture shows a charming baby octopus found deep in the ocean.

Welcome to Mr. C's Bio20 BLOG!

Hello Bio20,

This blog site will serve as a place to archive our progress in Bio20, to table concerns and/or questions, to offer additional thoughts or comments, or simply to "dump" on the course/content/teacher/classmates.

You will be expected to submit several postings during this course. Mr. C will provide a schedule of who is responsible each day. Postings will be graded as an assignment.

• As a minimum (1st mark) you should provide a brief review of what we did in class that day (bullet points are OK).
• Additional credit (2nd mark) will be given for providing thoughts about the material (e.g. where the topic(s) apply to real life, questions that remain unanswered, extensions on topics discussed, connections to other topics or courses, etc...

UNACCEPTABLE = "I thought the class was good"). Discuss the MATERIAL, not the CLASS.

• Full credit (3rd mark) will be given for doing the first two requirements, AND going 'above and beyond' (e.g. providing additional information, links to other relevant sites, photos, etc...).

The easiest approach is to show an attempt to answer any questions raised in the "thoughts" section.
NOTES:

1. WRITE YOUR NAME AND THE DATE OF THE DAY BEING DISCUSSED IN THE TITLE LINE
2. CLEARLY indicate each requirement with headings. Example: Review of material covered...... Thoughts on material..... "Above and beyond"...
   
3. AT THE END OF YOUR POSTING, GIVE YOURSELF A MARK OUT OF THREE (see marking guide above). YOU WILL BE ASKED TO JUSTIFY YOUR MARK IF IT SEEMS UNWARRANTED.
4. ENTRIES MUST BE POSTED WITHIN 5 DAYS OF THE CLASS (including weekends) OR A GRADE OF ZERO WILL BE ASSIGNED.

Feel free to have some fun with this site, but rudeness will not be tolerated ;(

Have a great day!
Mr. C