Explain how energy and nutrients enter, move through, and exit a food chain in an ecosystem.5/19/2016 In an ecosystem, the major input of energy is from the sun. Sunlight gives producers in ecosystems energy to photosynthesize, and allow them to produce glucose. This glucose produced within the plant will be moved into a 'sink' in the plants structure as starch, for example a fruit. This plant is an example of an autotroph, as it makes its own biological molecules to live off using only sunlight. Once this glucose has been created by the producer and consumed by the primary consumer, some of it is lost through respiration and through waste. This means that there is an efficiency of 10% of energy moving from producers to primary consumers. This primary consumer may then be consumed by a secondary consumer, who in turn will have lost energy hunting the primary consumer (movement, respiration etc). Large amounts of energy will once again be lost here through waste. Once the nutrients and other molecules have reached the top of the food chain, the organism may die. This dead matter then decomposes, and is consumed by bacteria. This means that the cycle essentially starts again and that the nutrients taken in are kept within the same cycle.
This answer would have scored 7 marks out of a possible 8. In order to achieve full marks, I should have expanded on how nutrients are recycled in the ecosystem e.g. taken back up by roots in plants.
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