How Animals Interact in an Ecosystem

How Animals Interact in an Ecosystem Animals interact with each other in numerous, complex ways. However, we can make some general statements about these interactions. This enables us to better understand the role that species play within their ecosystems and how individual species can positively or negatively affect the species around them. Of the various types of interactions between species, most involve resources and consumers. A resource, in ecological terms, is something (such as food, water, habitat, sunlight, or prey) that is required by an organism to perform a vital function such as growth or reproduction. A consumer is an organism that consumes a resource (such as predators, herbivores, or detritivores). Most interactions between animals involve one or more competitor species vying for a resource. Species interactions can be categorized into four basic groups based on how the participating species are affected by the interaction. They include competitive interactions, consumer-resource interactions, detritivore-detritus interactions, and mutualistic interactions. Competitive Interactions Competitive interactions are interactions involving two or more species that are vying for the same resource. In these interactions, both of the species involved are negatively  affected. Competitive interactions are in many cases indirect, such as when two species both consume the same resource but do not  directly interact with each other. Instead, they affect each other by  reducing the availability of the resource. An example of this type of interaction might be seen between lions and hyenas. Since both species feed on the same prey, they negatively affect each other by reducing the amount of that prey. One species may have trouble hunting in an area where the other is already present. Consumer-resource Interactions Consumers of consumer-resource interactions include predator-prey interactions and herbivore-plant interactions. These consumer-resource interactions affect the species involved in different ways. Usually, this type of interaction has a positive impact on the consumer species and a negative impact on the resource species. An example of a consumer-resource interaction would be a lion eating a zebra, or a zebra feeding on grass. In the first example, the zebra is the resource, while in the second example it is the consumer. Detritivore-detritus Interactions Detritivore-detritus interactions involve a species that consumes the detritus (dead or decomposing organic matter) of another species. The detritivore-detritus interaction is a positive interaction for the consumer species. It has no impact on the resource species since it is already dead. Detritivores include small creatures such as millipedes, slugs, woodlice, and sea cucumbers. By cleaning up decomposing plant and animal matter, they play an important role in maintaining the health of ecosystems. Mutualistic Interactions Mutualistic interactions are interactions in which both speciesresource and consumerbenefit from the interaction. An example of this is the relationship between plants and pollinators. Nearly three-quarters of flowering plants rely on animals to help them pollinate. In exchange for this service, animals such as bees and butterflies are rewarded with food in the form of pollen or nectar. The interaction is beneficial for both species, plants, and animals.

Sinclair Lewis Biography

Sinclair Lewis Biography Harry Sinclair Lewis was born on February 7, 1885, in Sauk Centre, Minnesota, the youngest of three boys. Sauk Centre, a bucolic prairie town of 2,800, was home to mainly Scandinavian families, and Lewis said he â€Å"attended the ordinary public school, along with many Madsens, Olesons, Nelsons, Hedins, Larsons,† many of whom would become the models for characters in his novels. Fast Facts: Sinclair Lewis Full Name: Harry Sinclair LewisOccupation: NovelistBorn: February 7, 1885 in Sauk Centre, MinnesotaDied: January 10, 1951 in Rome, ItalyEducation: Yale UniversityKey Accomplishments: Noble Prize in Literature (1930). Lewis was also awarded the Pulitzer Prize (1926), but he declined it.Spouses: Grace Hegger (m. 1914-1925) and Dorothy Thompson (m. 1928-1942)Children: Wells (with Hegger) and Michael (with Thompson)Notable Quote: â€Å"It has not yet been recorded that any human being has gained a very large or permanent contentment from meditation upon the fact that he is better off than others.† Early Career Lewis enrolled at Yale Univesity in 1903 and soon became involved in literary life on campus, writing for the literary review and the university newspaper, as well as working as a part-time reporter the Associated Press and the local newspaper. He didn’t graduate until 1908, having taken some time off to live in Upton Sinclair’s collaborative Helicon Home Colony in New Jersey and traveled to Panama. For some years after Yale, he drifted from coast to coast and from job to job, working as a reporter and editor while also working on short stories. By 1914, he was consistently seeing his short fiction in popular magazines like the Saturday Evening Post, and began working on novels. Between 1914 and 1919, he published five novels: Our Mr. Wrenn, The Trail of the Hawk, The Job, The Innocents, and Free Air. â€Å"All of them dead before the ink was dry,† he later said. Main Street With his sixth novel, Main Street (1920), Lewis finally found commercial and critical success. Recreating the Sauk Centre of his youth as Gopher Prairie, his searing satire of the narrow-minded insularity of small-town life was a hit with readers, selling 180,000 copies in its first year alone. Lewis reveled in the controversy surrounding the book. â€Å"One of the most treasured American myths had been that all American villages were peculiarly noble and happy, and here an American attacked that myth,† he wrote in 1930. â€Å"Scandalous.† Main Street was initially chosen for the 1921 Pulitzer Prize in fiction, but the Board of Trustees overruled the judges because the novel didn’t â€Å"present the wholesome atmosphere of American life† dictated by the rules. Lewis didn’t forgive the slight, and when he was awarded the Pulitzer in 1926 for Arrowsmith, he declined it. Nobel Prize Lewis followed up Main Street with novels like Babbitt (1922), Arrowsmith (1925), Mantrap (1926), Elmer Gantry (1927), The Man Who Knew Coolidge (1928), and Dodsworth (1929). In 1930, he became the first American awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of characters.† In his autobiographical statement to the Nobel committee, Lewis noted he had traveled the world, but â€Å"my real travelling [sic] has been sitting in Pullman smoking cars, in a Minnesota village, on a Vermont farm, in a hotel in Kansas City or Savannah, listening to the normal daily drone of what are to me the most fascinating and exotic people in the world- the Average Citizens of the United States, with their friendliness to strangers and their rough teasing, their passion for material advancement and their shy idealism, their interest in all the world and their boastful provincialism- the intricate complexities which an American novelist is privileged to portray.† Personal Life Lewis married twice, first to Vogue editor Grace Hegger (from 1914-1925) and then to journalist Dorothy Thompson (from 1928 to 1942). Each marriage resulted in one son, Wells (born 1917) and Michael (born 1930). Wells Lewis was killed in combat in October 1944, at the height of World War II. Final Years As an author, Lewis was extremely prolific, penning 23 novels between 1914 and his death in 1951. He also authored over 70 short stories, a handful of plays, and at least one screenplay. Twenty of his novels were adapted into movies. By the late 1930s, years of alcoholism and depression were eroding both the quality of his work and his personal relationships. His marriage to Dorothy Thompson failed in part because he felt her professional success made him look small by comparison, and he was increasingly jealous that other writers were becoming literary legends while his body of work was falling into relative obscurity. His heart weakened by heavy drinking, Lewis died in Rome on January 10, 1951. His cremated remains were returned to Sauk Centre, where he was buried in the family plot. In the days after his death, Dorothy Thompson wrote a nationally-syndicated eulogy for her former husband. â€Å"He hurt a great many people very much,† she observed. â€Å"For there were great hurts in himself, which he sometimes took out on others. Yet, in the 24 hours since his death, I have seen some of those he hurt most dissolved in tears. Something has gone- something prodigal, ribald, great, and high. The landscape is duller.†Ã‚  Ã‚   Sources Hutchisson, J. M. (1997).  The rise of Sinclair Lewis, 1920-1930. University Park, Pa: Pennsylvania State University Press.Lingeman, R. R. (2005).  Sinclair Lewis: Rebel from Main Street. St. Paul, Minn: Borealis BooksSchorer, M. (1961).  Sinclair Lewis: An American life. New York: McGraw-Hill.

MGMT402 U2 IP Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

MGMT402 U2 IP - Research Paper Example Consequently, the harassed victim is forced to file a complaint in the company’s grievance committee. Further, the victim’s not finding redress by submitting a complaint to the company’s grievance committee. The non-action or unfavorable action of the grievance committee may force the sexual harassment victims to file a harassment case in the courts of law. If the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) investigation shows the employer knew and did not prevent the supervisor’s harassment, the 1995 Auto Corp is has vicarious legal liability (Conte, 2010). In the case of Ellerth and Fargher labor case, the Supreme Court reiterated the company has vicarious legal liability for the supervisor’s harassment of the workplace victims if two conditions are present (Dale, 2005). First, the company knows of the sexual harassment acts and refuses to take the appropriate action to stop the sexual harassment acts. Likewise, The Code of Federal Regulations Pt 1604.11 states that management is liable it did implement reasonable care to prevent the harassment. Second, the victims sought the redress from the company’s grievance committee (GPO, 2007). Vicarious legal liability means the employer and the supervisor are liable for monetary damages. Further, the EEOC investigation team will implement the corresponding penalties on the guilty person and the employer, 1995 Auto Corp (EEOC, 2014). Similarly, management will be penalized for not doing its share to prevent workplace sexual harassment. Management is required to set into motion a grievance process for the abused employees. Likewise management must implement preventive measures to reduce future sexual harassment acts (Conte, 2010). Furthermore, the company must prioritize mediation over litigation (Conte, 2010). Mediation (amicable settlement) is less costly than litigation. Mediation may take possibly one or more meetings to