Ricky, an entomologist, is observing an ant colony in his back yard. After some observation, he discovers that all the ants travel down one of two distinct paths in order to find food to bring back to the colony. After taking some measurements, Ricky sees that path A is approximately 100 meters in length, and path B is approximately 150 meters in length. Ricky is now trying to make some scientific conclusions based on these observations. Which path will have lower pheromone density? Hint: In the natural world, ants of some species (initially) wander randomly, and upon finding food return to their colony while laying down pheromone trails. If other ants find such a path, they are likely not to keep travelling at random, but instead to follow the trail, returning and reinforcing it if they eventually find food (see Ant communication). Over time, however, the pheromone trail starts to evaporate, thus reducing its attractive strength. The more time it takes for an ant to travel down the path and back again, the more time the pheromones have to evaporate. A short path, by comparison, gets marched over more frequently, and thus the pheromone density becomes higher on shorter paths than longer ones. Pheromone evaporation also has the advantage of avoiding the convergence to a locally optimal solution. If there were no evaporation at all, the paths chosen by the first ants would tend to be excessively attractive to the following ones. In that case, the exploration of the solution space would be constrained. The influence of pheromone evaporation in real ant systems is unclear, but it is very important in artificial systems.[8]
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Answer: path B

Q: Henry is currently writing a research paper for his biology class. The subject of the paper is abiotic stress. For his paper, he is analyzing two different forests of differing stress levels and writing about the differences seen in the environments. For the area with a low level of stress Henry chose the Narshe Forest, located near the mountains of Harkal. The area of high stress that Henry will be looking at is the Midgar forest. After choosing the two areas, Henry feels he deserves a break from his paper and goes to watch a baseball game. Which forest will have less biodiversity? Hint: Biodiversity is determined by many things, and one of them is abiotic stress. If an environment is highly stressful, biodiversity tends to be low. If abiotic stress does not have a strong presence in an area, the biodiversity will be much higher.This idea leads into the understanding of how abiotic stress and endangered species are related. It has been observed through a variety of environments that as the level of abiotic stress increases, the number of species decreases. This means that species are more likely to become population threatened, endangered, and even extinct, when and where abiotic stress is especially harsh.
A: Midgar

Question: Two neighboring islands had different sized populations. Green island had a small population. Red island had a large population and environmental problems. Researchers studied these islands over a span of 5 decades. Which island had a lower birth rate? Hint: In nature, when the population size is small, there is usually plenty of food and other resources for each individual. When there is plenty of food and other resources, organisms can easily reproduce, so the birth rate is high. As the population increases, the food supply, or the supply of another necessary resource, may decrease. When necessary resources, such as food, decrease, some individuals will die. Overall, the population cannot reproduce at the same rate, so the birth rates drop. This will cause the population growth rate to decrease.
Answer: Red

[Q]: Two friends were into natural sciences. Tom was more into Geology, while Rick studied Ecology. Which student read more about nonliving components of the habitat? Hint: Ecology is the study of ecosystems. An ecosystem consists of all the living and nonliving components of the habitat. Whereas nutrients and certain elements are recycled through ecosystems, energy moves in just one direction. Many interactions among species within an ecosystem are centered around the flow of energy. The formation of ecosystems, from new land to current habitats, is usually based on the pioneer species, and these species are able to live in an area due to the nonliving factors, such as the climate, the soil and the amount of rainfall, of that area. The populations within an ecosystem also determine the stability of the system. Recent tremendous increases in the human population have raised many important ecological issues.
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[A]: Rick

input: Please answer the following: John was driving through the Mohave desert. He first added antifreeze to the water in his radiator. He noted that in his journal as case A. Unfortunately, after some time he ran out of antifreeze, and couldn't add antifreeze any more. He noted that as case B. In which case the water would have higher boiling point, case A or case B? Hint: Antifreeze could also be called "antiboil" because it also raises the boiling point of the water in a car radiator. Hot weather combined with a hot engine can easily raise the temperature of the water in the radiator above 100 C, which is the boiling point of pure water. If the water boils, it could cause the engine to overheat and become seriously damaged. However, if antifreeze has been added to the water, the boiling point is much higher. For example a 50 percent antifreeze solution has a boiling point of 129 C. Unless the water gets hotter than this, it won't boil and ruin the engine.
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output: case A

In central Ireland there are two farms next to two very similar lakes, and both farms use the same fertilizer to grow crops. The farm next to lake Montopeke gets rain on a regular basis and so the farmer doesn't need to water his crops as much. The farm that is adjacent to lake Costanza hardly gets any rain at all though. Both farms are able to prosper and do well though despite the different amount of rain they get. Which lake will have more dead zones? Hint: Rain dissolves fertilizer in the soil. Runoff carries it away. The fertilizer ends up in bodies of water, from ponds to oceans. Nitrogen is a fertilizer in the water. Since there is a lot of nitrogen, it causes algae to grow out of control. Pictured below is a pond covered with algae ( Figure below ). Algae use up carbon dioxide in the water. After the algae die, decomposers break down the dead tissue. The decomposers use up all the oxygen in the water. This creates a dead zone. A dead zone is an area in a body of water where nothing grows because there is too little oxygen. There is a large dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico ( Figure below ). The U.S. states outlined on the map have rivers that drain into the Gulf of Mexico. The rivers drain vast agricultural lands. The water carries fertilizer from these areas into the Gulf.
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Answer:
Montopeke