What biodiversity is and how it is counted. The three levels, the number of species on the Earth, the rise of diversity towards the tropics, and the species-area line, which Python fits to a table of model data.
3 lessons, about 1 h 25 min3 simulations11 problems3 practice questionsPython in every lesson
Created by StemPy LabBiodiversity is the variety of life at three levels. This lesson names the three levels, gives the standard example of each, and shows how a species diversity index counts both the number of species and how evenly they are shared.
Only about 1.5 million species have been described, and the real number is far larger. This lesson gives the shares of the animals, the plants and the insects, shows why the tropics are rich in species, and gives the three hypotheses that try to explain it.
The number of species grows with the area that is explored, in a curve that becomes a straight line on a log scale. This lesson gives the species-area equation with its slope Z, fits it to a table of model data in Python, and shows why the diversity of species keeps an ecosystem steady.
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