1. What factors, biological and cultural, make tigers particularly vulnerable to extinction?

2. What does the term biodiversity refer to?  List some of the different levels to which the term is applied.

3. Explain how genetic diversity is important to the survival of a species. What happens to genetic diversity:

as individual populations become smaller? 

as the number of populations decreases?

4. What is inbreeding depression?

5. How many species have been described?   What is a reasonable estimate for the total number of species on Earth?

6. What is the latitudinal gradient in species diversity?

7. What is the difference between extinction and extirpation?

8. What is meant by the background rate of extinction?  What is a mass extinction?

9. What caused the 5 previous mass extinction episodes?

10. How does the 6th mass extinction differ?

11. How does the current extinction rate compare to the background rate?

12. How many species are known to have gone extinct in the U.S. in the last 200 years?

13. What is the IUCN Red List? How does it help in the effort to save biodiversity?

14. What does the Living Planet Index measure?  What are the trends in the most recently released version?

15. What are the 4 most important causes of species extinction and loss of biodiversity?

16. Know some examples of invasive species and how they harm biodiversity.

17. What type of species are especially vulnerable to overharvesting?

18. Explain how and why climate change is likely to effect biodiversity.

19. What is the root cause of all the biodiversity problems?

20. What are the benefits of preserving biodiversity?

    a. ecosystem services-

    b. food security- 

    c. new products- esp.  pharmaceuticals-

    d. tourism and recreation- 

21. What is the Biophilia hypothesis?

22. What is the effect on species diversity of fragmenting habitat? 

    50 % loss of habitat =  what % loss of species?

    90% loss of habitat = what % loss of species?

23. In what way are many of our National Parks "islands"?

24. What are the pros and cons of the Endangered Species Act (ESA)?

25. What are the pros and cons of captive breeding programs?

26. What do we mean by flagship or umbrella species? How does identifying them help preserve biodiversity?

27. What are the goals of the Convention on Biodiversity? Has the U.S. signed it?

28. What are biodiversity hotspots? How much of the world's biodiversity is included in the 34 hotspots?

29. Regarding U.S. biodiversity:

    What three states have the largest number of extinct/presumed extinct species?

    What are the top 4 states in terms of number of threatened/endangered species?