AP BIOLOGY

Detailed explanation-1: -Each living thing in an ecosystem is part of multiple food chains. Each food chain is one possible path that energy and nutrients may take as they move through the ecosystem. All of the interconnected and overlapping food chains in an ecosystem make up a food web.

Detailed explanation-2: -A heterotroph is an organism that eats other plants or animals for energy and nutrients. The term stems from the Greek words hetero for “other” and trophe for “nourishment.”

Detailed explanation-3: -A food chain outlines who eats whom. A food web is all of the food chains in an ecosystem. Each organism in an ecosystem occupies a specific trophic level or position in the food chain or web. Producers, who make their own food using photosynthesis or chemosynthesis, make up the bottom of the trophic pyramid.

Detailed explanation-4: -All species in the food webs can be distinguished into basal species (autotrophs, such as plants), intermediate species (herbivores and intermediate level carnivores, such as grasshopper and scorpion) or top predators (high level carnivores such as fox) (Figure 1). These feeding groups are referred as trophic levels.

Detailed explanation-5: -Food chain is a linear sequence of organisms which starts from producer organisms and ends with decomposer species. Food web is a connection of multiple food chains.