| Term | Definition | | Antiscience | Antiscience refers to attitudes or beliefs that reject or oppose scientific ideas, methods, and principles, ranging from skepticism about specific technologies to outright denial of established scientific consensus. |
| Artificial Selection | Artificial selection (or selective breeding) is the intentional, human-driven process of breeding plants or animals to enhance specific, desirable, inherited traits over generations. Unlike natural selection, where the environment determines survival, humans act as the selective force to promote traits like increased food yield, specialized aesthetics, or functionality. |
| Atmosphere | The gaseous envelope surrounding the Earth. The dry atmosphere consists almost entirely of nitrogen (78%) and oxygen (21%), together with a number of trace gases, such as argon (0.93%), helium, radiatively active greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide (0.042%), and ozone. The atmosphere also contains water vapor. |
| B cells | Specialized white blood cells and crucial components of the adaptive immune system, responsible for humoral immunity by producing antibodies. Originating and maturing in the bone marrow, they detect foreign antigens, differentiate into plasma cells to secrete specific antibodies, and form memory cells for long-term immunity. |
| Biomass | Materials that are biological in origin, including organic material (both living and dead) from above and below ground, for example, trees, crops, grasses, tree litter, roots, and animals and animal waste. |
| Biosphere | The part of the Earth system comprising all ecosystems and living organisms, in the atmosphere, on land (terrestrial biosphere) or in the oceans (marine biosphere), including derived dead organic matter, such as litter, soil organic matter and oceanic detritus. |
| Biotechnology | A set of tools that uses living organisms (or parts of organisms) to make or modify a product, improve plants, trees or animals, or develop microorganisms for specific uses. Examples of biotechnology include traditional applications, such as the making of bread, cheese, wine and beer, and more modern applications to grow or culture cells for research or to make genetically modified crops for food, feed, fuel and fiber. |
| Carbon Cycle | All parts (reservoirs) and fluxes of carbon. The cycle is usually thought of as four main reservoirs of carbon interconnected by pathways of exchange. The reservoirs are the atmosphere, terrestrial biosphere (usually includes freshwater systems), oceans, and sediments (includes fossil fuels). The annual movements of carbon, the carbon exchanges between reservoirs, occur because of various chemical, physical, geological, and biological processes. |
| Carbon Dioxide (CO2) | A naturally occurring gas, and also a by-product of burning fossil fuels and biomass, as well as land-use changes and other industrial processes. It is the principal human caused greenhouse gas that affects the Earth's radiative balance. It is the reference gas against which other greenhouse gases are measured and therefore has a Global Warming Potential of 1. |
| Carbon Footprint | The total amount of greenhouse gases that are emitted into the atmosphere each year by a person, family, building, organization, or company. |
