Noun

(en noun)

A system formed by an ecological community and its environment that functions as a unit.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2012-01

, author=Donald Worster , title=A Drier and Hotter Future , volume=100, issue=1, page=70 , magazine= citation , passage=Phoenix and Lubbock are both caught in severe drought, and it is going to get much worse. We may see many such [dust] storms in the decades ahead, along with species extinctions, radical disturbance of ecosystems , and intensified social conflict over land and water. Welcome to the Anthropocene, the epoch when humans have become a major geological and climatic force.}}

The interconnectedness of organisms (plants, animals, microbes) with each other and their environment.

(business, marketing) A set of interconnected products and services.

Noun

(en noun)

A collection of dead life forms that are found together, having previously interacted as a community within an ecosystem.

*1977 , H. Löffler, ?D. Danielopol, Aspects of Ecology and Zoogeography of Recent and Fossil Ostracoda , page 454:

This sort of thanatocoenose is typical of lakes with a semi-arid climate (Early Triassic period in the Kuznetsk Basin, Middle Jurassic- Lower Cretaceous of Middle Asia).

*1989 , Hans M. Bolli, ?John B. Saunders, ?Katharina Perch-Nielsen, Plankton Stratigraphy , Volume 2, page 764:

The fossil diatom assemblage or thanatocoenose found in sediments typially represents as little as 1-5% ofthe original living assemblage or biocoenose.

*2008 , R. Lee Lyman, Quantitative Paleozoology , page 23:

Given that paleozoologists sample the geological record (i.e., where faunal remains are deposited as a particular kind of sedimentary particle), they don't always have a complete thanatocoenose lying on the lab table.