Short answers, pulled from the story.
The term ecology was coined in 1866 by the German scientist Ernst Haeckel. This definition established a specific word for the concept of nature as a web of relationships that existed long before a single term could describe it.
Modern ecology began to take shape as a distinct scientific discipline in the 1890s. This shift was driven by American botanists who moved the field from simple description to analytical natural history.
Rachel Carson published Silent Spring in 1962 to alert the public to toxic pesticides like DDT. This book bridged the gap between scientific understanding of ecosystem degradation and environmental politics, law, and natural resource management.
Robert Paine coined the term keystone species in 1969. This term refers to species connected to a disproportionately large number of other species in the food web.
The transition to an oxygen-dominant atmosphere known as the Great Oxidation did not begin until approximately 2.4 to 2.3 billion years ago. Photosynthetic processes started 0.3 to 1 billion years prior to this event.
The term human ecology was formally introduced in 1921. This interdisciplinary investigation defines man as the ecological dominant in plant and animal communities or as another animal affecting and being affected by his physical environment.