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Finger [1]
3 years ago
7

What happens to a ecosystems food chain if the concentration pollutants move up.

Biology
1 answer:
Furkat [3]3 years ago
5 0
<span><span>Producers: Plants are producers because they make usable energy from light.  They turn sunlight, carbon dioxide and water into sugar energy.  Producers are the foundation of the food web, because they provide the base energy needed by all wildlife.</span><span><span>Primary Consumers: </span>Herbivores are primary consumers, because they receive their energy directly from plants. </span><span><span>Secondary Consumers: </span>Carnivores are secondary consumers, because they receive their energy by eating primary consumers.  Secondary consumers are predators.  An omnivore acts as both a primary and secondary consumer, because omnivores eat both animals and plants. </span><span>Decomposer:  Decomposers get energy by breaking down dead plants and animals.  They are extremely important, because decomposers convert dead matter into energy and release nutrients that can be added back to soils and ecosystems.</span></span>


<span>What is a Food Web?
</span>A <span>food web </span>is a diagram displaying how all the producers, decomposers and primary and secondary consumers interact in an ecosystem.  It shows how energy is transferred between species. 

A food web can be very simple - with one producer, consumer and decomposer- or a food web can be extremely complicated.  A food web of an entire woodland ecosystem becomes complex when you include every species from plants to insects and mammals. 


There Is More to a Food Web than Energy

When animals eat their prey, they consume more than just energy.  They also absorb all the chemicals and nutrients inside the prey.  For example, when you eat a banana you get energy from the banana, as well as the added benefits of potassium and vitamin A. 

Sometimes animals ingest pollutants that can become stored in their fat and tissues.  Human-caused pollution has added heavy metals, oil, and <span>industrial and pharmaceutical chemicals </span>to the environment.  Plants, fish and other species absorb these toxins, and as they are eaten by predators, the toxins are then absorbed into the predators’ tissues.  As the chain of predator and prey continues up the food web the toxins become more concentrated and move higher and higher up the food web.  The pollutants can have a disastrous effect on the food web and potentially kill species.


What happens when a Chemical is Added to the Food Web? 
To explain the true impacts of chemicals on the food web, we’re going to use the real world example of mercury poisoning. 

Coal-fired power plants burn coal and release mercury into the atmosphere as a byproduct.  Over time, mercury falls to Earth through rain, snow and natural settling.  Rain carries the mercury to streams and rivers and it eventually settles in lakes and ponds. 

After mercury enters lakes and ponds, bacteria transform mercury into a more easily absorbed toxic substance called methylmercury.  Aquatic plants, bacteria and plankton absorb methylmercury from the surrounding water. 

It’s at this point that mercury becomes added to the food web.  Eventually, the contaminated plants, bacteria and plankton will be eaten by predators, such as fish.  The methylmercury toxins will move into the tissues of the fish and poison a new level of the food web. 


Magnifying Up the Food Web 
Individual plants, plankton and bacteria only have a small amount of methylmercury.  The problem begins at the next level of the food web.  Fish don’t eat just one plankton or plant – they can eat hundreds or thousands of them!  All the mercury in each of the plankton or plants has now been eaten by a fish and absorbed into the fat and tissues.  After eating 100 plankton, the methylmercury in the fish is now 100 times what it was in the plankton! 

It doesn’t stop there.  The higher and higher up the food chain you go, the more food is necessary to maintain energy and activity. 

<span>If a small fish eats 50 mercury contaminated plants.And a large fish eats 100 small fishAnd an eagle eats 100 large fish.</span>

50X100X100 = 500,000  The concentration of mercury in the eagle is 500,000 times larger than it was in the plankton!!

The process that causes the concentration of a substance to increase as it moves up the food web is called bioaccumulation.  Methylmercury is a famous example of bioaccumulation, because mercury poisoning causes neurological disorders, reduced reproduction and even death in raptors and mammals.  People are susceptible to mercury poisoning by eating too much contaminated fish.  

Study the diagram to see how mercury bioaccumulates up this common food web. 

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In 1968, Brezhnev ordered the soviet army and troops of other eastern European nations to crush a liberal communist regime in __
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In 1968, Brezhnev ordered the soviet army and troops of other eastern European nations to crush a liberal communist regime in : B. Czechoslovakia

He ordered about 500,000 troops to invade Czechoslovakian Borders using the Blitzkrieg approach

hope this helps
6 0
3 years ago
Starch molecules are too large to pass through the
mario62 [17]

Answer:

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If the beaker was not cleaned, starch could have been in it.

8 0
3 years ago
Read 2 more answers
What assumptions did Engelmann make in order to conclude that red and violet-blue light were more effective than green light in
iren [92.7K]

Answer:

The distribution of chloroplasts in each algae cell was approximately the same.

The number of bacteria grouped at each wavelength (color) was approximately proportional to the amount of oxygen produced by this part of the algae.

Explanation:

Photosynthetic pigments absorb blue, red and green lights. The wavelength of light that is the most effective in driving photosynthesis is 420 nanometers, which corresponds to blue light.

The wavelength of 475nm and 650nm are most effective in driving photosynthesis.

6 0
3 years ago
In man, assume that spotted skin (S) is dominant over non-spotted skin (s) and that wooly hair (W) is dominant over non-wooly ha
Brut [27]

Answer:

Total four genotypes and its frequency  

SsWw – 4/16

ssWw- 4/16

Ssww - 4/16

ssww - 4/16

Phenotype –  

SsWw – Heterozygous  Spotted skin and heterozygous wooled hair

ssWw  - Homozygous non-spotted skin and heterozygous wooled hair

Ssww  -  Heterozygous  Spotted skin and Homozygous non -wooled hair

ssww  - Homozygous non-spotted skin  and Homozygous non -wooled hair

Explanation:

Given -

Allele for spotted skin is "S"

Allele for non-spotted skin is "s"

Allele for Wooly hair is "W"

Allele for non-wooly hair is "w"

Allele "S" is dominant over "s"

And Allele "W" is dominant over "w"

Cross is carried out between heterozygous spotted, non-wooly man and heterozygous wooly-haired, non-spotted woman

Genotype of heterozygous spotted, non-wooly man - Ssww

Genotype of  heterozygous wooly-haired, non-spotted woman - ssWw

Ssww * ssWw

Sw         Sw         sw         sw

sW SsWw SsWw ssWw ssWw

sw Ssww Ssww ssww ssww

sW SsWw SsWw ssWw ssWw

sw Ssww Ssww ssww ssww

Total four genotypes and its frequency  

SsWw – 4/16

ssWw- 4/16

Ssww - 4/16

ssww - 4/16

Phenotype –  

SsWw – Heterozygous  Spotted skin and heterozygous wooled hair

ssWw  - Homozygous non-spotted skin and heterozygous wooled hair

Ssww  -  Heterozygous  Spotted skin and Homozygous non -wooled hair

ssww  - Homozygous non-spotted skin  and Homozygous non -wooled hair

8 0
3 years ago
Expected prevalence of a disease is:______.
goldfiish [28.3K]

Answer: c) the anticipated geographical spread of a disease based on past observances.

Explanation: Prevalence simply means the widespread of a thing or condition. In epidemiology, prevalence can be defined as the total number of people in a population that is affected by a medical condition or total number of cases of a disease in a population in a given period of time.

Expected prevalence of a disease is therefore the anticipated widespread of a disease or the anticipated total number of cases of a disease in a population based on past observed incidences.

5 0
3 years ago
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