Trident ECOL100 Module 3 case and SLP

Module 3 - Case

EFFICIENCY AND ADAPTATION

Case Assignment

As we begin to consider some parallels between the business world and the natural world, we can identify some very similar patterns in extinction, adaptation, and supply and demand in both. For example, an organism faces many challenges as it attempts to survive in the natural world, just as a business will struggle to succeed in the marketplace. When resources in the environment are limited, like consumers in the marketplace, organisms and businesses will compete. Those that can maximize their efficiency at production will succeed over those that cannot. Let’s look at how the principles of economics determine production costs and the role that these costs play in the success of a business. (Complete the production costs tutorial before you proceed).

Part I

In this tutorial you learned about different types of costs faced by a business. Organisms face similar costs, and require common elements as building blocks: carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and phosphorus. Plant tissues are composed primarily of long chains of sugars called cellulose. They have specialized machinery, chloroplasts, that capture energy from sunlight using pigments such aschlorophyll, and use it to build sugars in a process called photosynthesis. These sugars are used in many places throughout the plant, both structurally and metabolically.

Visit the Missouri Botanical Garden site http://www.mbgnet.net/bioplants/main.html for more information about the basic structure and function of plants. Read the contents on each link found at the left-hand side of the Web page, paying special attention to the content in “Plant Adaptations.” After you view these resources provided on plant biology, apply the following economic terms to plants for the first part of this Case Assignment:

Short-run costs

· What is a fixed cost for a plant? What are variable costs?

Long-run costs

· What plant structures should be considered a part of its long-run costs?

· What plant structures are indivisible inputs (an input that cannot be scaled down to produce a small quantity of output)?

Part II

Now apply the questions above to an extinct business: choose either Kodak or Blockbuster. Do some independent research and use the production cost tutorial to address these questions:

· What were the fixed and variable costs for this business?

· What were some of their long-run costs, including divisible inputs?

· Who were their competitors?

· What were the factors that contributed to the decision to shut down production?

In the natural world, invasive species commonly displace species of organisms. Provide one example of an invasive species in your region that has imposed new competition to a native species and draw parallels between this example and the extinct business that you chose.

Assignment Expectations

You are provided with many scholarly references to complete this assignment. Include a References section that lists these and any additional sources you used (refer to the Background page). For any additional research you are required to do to complete your assignment, please use scholarly references such as a peer-reviewed journal article or a government-sponsored or university-sponsored website. As you read through your sources, take notes from your sources and then write your paper in your own words, describing what you have learned from your research. Direct quotes should be limited and must be designated by quotation marks. Paraphrased ideas must give credit to the original author, for example (Murray, 2014). Direct copying from “homework help” websites will not receive credit.

For this Case Assignment, answer all questions using full sentences and use Part I and Part II as your headings to organize your paper. The length of this assignment should be 2–3 pages.

Under each main section, use subtitles to organize your answers to the questions. For example:

Part I: Economics of Plant Production and Photosynthesis

Short-Run Costs

Long-Run Costs

Part II: Case Study: Production Costs for Kodak

Costs

Competition and the Shut-Down Decision

Extinctions: Parallels in the Business World

References

Module 3 - SLP

EFFICIENCY AND ADAPTATION

Cooperation and trade are common in the natural world. Based on the cost of production and the constraints presented by the environment, an organism may be more successful by trading for a product than producing it. In this situation the organism may specialize in one product and trade for another. In this SLP we will examine an example of trading partners, mycorrhizal fungi and plants, and compare it to the principles of international trade, an important component of macroeconomics. After you view this tutorial, consider some of the principles it introduced and how they apply to specialization and trade between the symbiotic partners that make up a mycorrhizal association.

In the videos and tutorials you completed for your Case 3 Assignment, you learned about how plants can utilize sunlight to build sugars. Some of these sugars are sent to plant roots for growth and storage. Mycorrhizal fungi live within or surrounding plant roots as a symbiosis. Mycorrhizal fungi cannot make their own food. As fungi, they have the ability to decompose organic (carbon-based) material, but they do not contain chlorophyll and must obtain carbon directly from the environment (like we do!). The fossil record shows mycorrhizal fungi living in association with the earliest plants, bryophytes.

Accessed at http://www.larousse.fr/encyclopedie/divers/h%C3%A9patique/46890

Scientists believe that this symbiosis may have been key to plants’ success on land. Begin your introduction to this symbiosis at the Compost Gardener, and be sure to view their video. Next, proceed to this site maintained by the University of Western Australia, School of Plant Biology:http://mycorrhizas.info/vam.html to complete your research and locate important images for your SLP assignment.

Using the resources provided above, develop a PowerPoint presentation that includes the following:

Slides 1–3

Compose a brief overview of the structure and function of plant roots. Include definitions and images of these terms: epidermis, exodermis, cortex, endodermis, and root hairs. You can refer to the following resource:
Roots: http://mycorrhizas.info/root.html

Slides 4–10

Provide an explanation of the symbiosis between mycorrhizal fungi and plant roots. Include definitions and explanation of the differences between Arbuscular mycorrhiza and Ectomycorrhizal fungi using the following images:

Mycorrhizal fungi pdf 1

Mycorrhizal fungi pdf 2

Ectomycorrhizal fungi pdf EMF 1

And the websites: http://mycorrhizas.info/vam.html

http://www.the-compost-gardener.com/plant-fungi.html

Slides 11–15

Discussion of the costs and benefits associated with this trade arrangement using the following resources:

Terms of Trade.ppt

Walder, F., Niemann, H., Natarajan, M., Lehmann, M. F., Boller, T. & Wiemken, A. Mycorrhizal Networks: Common Goods of Plants Shared under Unequal Terms of Trade. Plant Physiology. 2012. 159:789–797. Accessed on August 8, 2014, athttp://www.plantphysiol.org/content/159/2/789.full

Slide 16

Now view information by Green Economy about a company that markets this symbiosis. Read more about mycorrhizae and Mycorrhizal Applications, Inc. at their website http://mycorrhizae.com/.

· How can the trade between these organisms benefit our economy and land use?

Slide 17—References

SLP Assignment Expectations

For this SLP assignment you will develop a PowerPoint Presentation that is 17–20 slides in length and addresses the requirements outlined above. Place the text containing the answers to the questions above in the Notes section of your slide presentation. Reference all of your answers in your Notes sections with citations (Murray 2014). Your slides should contain labeled images that illustrate the text that you included in your Notes sections. Provide the website or reference for each labeled image. Be sure your last slide is a references slide that contains the full reference cited on your slides. Many resources are provided for you. This assignment should not require much independent research.