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All heterotrophs (except blood and gut parasites) have to convert solid food into soluble compounds which are capable of being absorbed (digestion). Then the soluble products of digestion for the organism are being broken down for the release of energy (respiration). All heterotrophs depend on autotrophs for their nutrition. Heterotrophic ...
If the heterotroph uses chemical energy, it is a chemoheterotroph (e.g., humans and mushrooms). If it uses light for energy, then it is a photoheterotroph (e.g., green non-sulfur bacteria). Heterotrophs represent one of the two mechanisms of nutrition (trophic levels), the other being autotrophs (auto = self, troph = nutrition).
A consumer is a heterotroph and a producer is an autotroph. Like sea angels, they take in organic moles by consuming other organisms, so they are commonly called consumers. Heterotrophs can be classified by what they usually eat as herbivores, carnivores, omnivores, or decomposers. [1]
In a general sense, the flow of energy is a function of primary productivity with temperature, water availability, and light availability. [25] For example, among aquatic ecosystems, higher rates of production are usually found in large rivers and shallow lakes than in deep lakes and clear headwater streams. [ 25 ]
For example, most plants are photolithoautotrophic, since they use light as an energy source, water as electron donor, and CO 2 as a carbon source. All animals and fungi are chemoorganoheterotrophic , since they use organic substances both as chemical energy sources and as electron/hydrogen donors and carbon sources.
Heterotrophs consume rather than produce biomass energy as they metabolize, grow, and add to levels of secondary production. A food web depicts a collection of polyphagous heterotrophic consumers that network and cycle the flow of energy and nutrients from a productive base of self-feeding autotrophs .
Photosynthesis changes sunlight into chemical energy, splits water to liberate O 2, and fixes CO 2 into sugar. Most photosynthetic organisms are photoautotrophs, which means that they are able to synthesize food directly from carbon dioxide and water using energy from light.
Photoheterotrophs generate ATP using light, in one of two ways: [6] [7] they use a bacteriochlorophyll-based reaction center, or they use a bacteriorhodopsin.The chlorophyll-based mechanism is similar to that used in photosynthesis, where light excites the molecules in a reaction center and causes a flow of electrons through an electron transport chain (ETS).