AP BIOLOGY

Detailed explanation-1: -All of the interconnected and overlapping food chains in an ecosystem make up a food web. Organisms in food chains are grouped into categories called trophic levels. Roughly speaking, these levels are divided into producers (first trophic level), consumers (second, third, and fourth trophic levels), and decomposers.

Detailed explanation-2: -An overlapping food chain is also known as a food web. An overlapping food chain, or food web, will show multiple food chains and their relationships. Some food chains within an ecosystem will share members; for example, several different types of animals may eat a mouse.

Detailed explanation-3: -Energy is transferred between organisms in food webs from producers to consumers. The energy is used by organisms to carry out complex tasks. The vast majority of energy that exists in food webs originates from the sun and is converted (transformed) into chemical energy by the process of photosynthesis in plants.

Detailed explanation-4: -Primary producers use energy from the sun to produce their own food in the form of glucose, and then primary producers are eaten by primary consumers who are in turn eaten by secondary consumers, and so on, so that energy flows from one trophic level, or level of the food chain, to the next.

Detailed explanation-5: -Food Webs. A food web represents multiple pathways through which energy and matter flow through an ecosystem. It includes many intersecting food chains. It demonstrates that most organisms eat and are eaten by more than one species.