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Outline
What is Biodiversity?
Estimation of Biodiversity
Benefits of Biodiversity
Threats to Biodiversity
Biodiversity of India
Genetic Engineering and Biodiversity
What is Biodiversity?
Variation of life forms within a given
ecosystem, biome or for the entire Earth.
Measure of the health of biological systems.
Biodiversity on Earth today consists of
many millions of distinct biological species,
which is the product of four billion years of
evolution.
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Definitions
Variation of life at all levels of biological organization
Measure of the relative diversity among organisms present
in different ecosystems.
Totality of genes, species, and ecosystems of a region.
1992 UN Earth Summit at Rio "the variability among
living organisms from all sources, including, 'inter alia',
terrestrial, marine, and other aquatic ecosystems, and
the ecological complexes of which they are part: this
includes diversity within species, between species and
of ecosystems".
adopted by the United Nations Convention on Biological
Diversity.
Biodiversity at 3 Levels
Species Biodiversity
Number or range of species in a given area
Genetic Biodiversity
Variations of genes within a species
Ecosystem Diversity
Diversity of habitat in a given area
Estimation of Biodiversity
Biodiversity is conceptobjectives measures for
empirical measurement
2 criteria : Species richness & Species Evenness
Measurement Indices:
Species richnessonly number of species.
Simpson indexno. and relative abundance
Shannon indexspecies as symbols and populations as
probability
Alpha diversityno. of taxa within the ecosystem
Beta diversity is species diversity between ecosystems;
unique taxa caomparison
Gamma diversity is a measure of the overall diversity
for different ecosystems within a region.
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Venkateshwara: 4 species
CIT: 2 species
58,808 vertebrates:
29,300 fish,
5,743 amphibians,
8,240 reptiles,
10,234 birds,
5,416 mammals.
15,000 mosses,
13,025 ferns,
980 gymnosperms,
199,350 dicotyledons,
59,300 monocotyledons;
74,000-120,000 fungi,
10,000 lichens;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodiversity
BenefitsAgriculture
Gigantic economic impacts
All food resources are products of biodiversity e.g.
Rice, wheat, potato
We depend upon 40,000 types of plants and
animals.
Few strains were domesticated. Thousands of wild
relatives exist.
80% of our food comes from just 15 species
Infinite wealth of genetic material. Help combat
crop diseases, and prevent failure and starvation
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Benefits-Science
Unique materials produced by animals
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Environmental Functions
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Biodiversity Hotspots
Threats to Biodiversity
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Biodiversity Conservation
In Situ
1972 Project Tiger; 27 reserves; 35,000 km2
Estimated less than 4000 tigers left in India
Ex Situ
Gene Banks
Zoos, Safari parks
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Risks of GMOs
May require large chemical and
other inputs for their survival
May escape to the environment and
become invasive; catastrophic effects
In food, may produce substances that
may be dangerous to health.
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