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Ecology Reviewer

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Oxygen - A nonmetallic element constituting 21 percent of the atmosphere by volume that occurs as a diatomic gas, O2, and in many compounds such as water and iron ore. It combines with most elements, is essential for plant and animal respiration, and is required for nearly all combustion. Atomic number 8; atomic weight 15.9994; melting point -218.4°C; boiling point -183.0°C; gas density at 0°C 1.429 grams per liter; valence 2.
Failures in the oxygen cycle within the hydrosphere (the combined mass of water found on, under, and over the surface of a planet) can result in the development of hypoxic zones. The main driving factor of the oxygen cycle is photosynthesis, which is responsible for the modern Earth's atmosphere and life as we know it. * Dead zones are hypoxic (low-oxygen) areas in the world's oceans and large lakes, caused by "excessive nutrient pollution from human activities coupled with other factors that deplete the oxygen required to support most marine life in bottom and near-bottom water.
The oxygen cycle is the cycle that helps move oxygen through the three main regions of the Earth, the Atmosphere, the Biosphere, and the Lithosphere. The Atmosphere is of course the region of gases that lies above the Earth’s surface and it is one of the largest reservoirs of free oxygen on earth. The Biosphere is the sum of all the Earth’s ecosystems. This also has some free oxygen produced from photosynthesis and other life processes. The largest reservoir of oxygen is the lithosphere. Most of this oxygen is not on its own or free moving but part of chemical compounds such as silicates and oxides.
In the atmosphere Oxygen is freed by the process called photolysis. This is when high energy sunlight breaks apart oxygen bearing molecules to produce free oxygen. One of the most well known photolysis it the ozone cycle. O2 oxygen molecule is broken down to atomic

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