Plants are the basis of nearly all ecosystems on Earth because they carry out the process of photosynthesis. Plants harvest light energy from the sun and store it as potential chemical energy. When plants are eaten or die, their stored energy becomes available to other organisms. And when predators eat those other organisms, the energy flows into them. Each level at which energy is stored in organisms is called a . When an organism eats a plant, the energy and nutrients stored in the consumed organism flows up to the . This movement of energy through food chains is why models represent plants as the of a food chain or food web.

Trophic level

Consumer

Producer

Explanation:

All living organisms require energy for their life processes, which they obtain by taken in food. In an ecosystem, this food is derived when organisms feed on each other. This process that eventually leads to a flow of energy within organisms is called FOOD CHAIN.

A food chain or food web always begins with a unique set of organisms called PRODUCERS. Producers are autotrophs capable of harvesting light energy from the sun and use it to produce their food (chemical) in a process called PHOTOSYNTHESIS. Other organisms called HETEROTROPHS feed on these producers to derive energy. In ecology, they are called CONSUMERS. Other consumers feed on the previous ones also to get energy.

Hence, each step of the food chain is occupied by organisms that obtain and store energy by feeding on another organism. This step is called TROPHIC LEVEL.

In a nutshell, a PRODUCER (usually plants) starts the food chain/web due to its photosynthetic ability. This producer gets eaten by an organism called CONSUMER and in the process, the energy and nutrient stored in the producers flows to the consumer. Another consumers feeds on the previous one and the energy keeps flowing. Each step of the food chain occupied by an organism that stores and transfers this energy is called TROPHIC LEVEL.

from almost the creation of the first true maps of the earth, people started seeing how continents would be able to fit together.   in particular, people noticed that south america fits almost exactly into africa.

you should be aware that while world maps were around early in the 1600’s and better defined by the end of the 1700’s, those maps were not ‘public’ but were treated as state secrets.   and so it was not till much later that the broader ‘science’ community had access to good quality and accurate world maps.

get the whole story here…

it is now known that most of the major continental masses can be fit together in a jigsaw process.   in fact we now know that the continents were indeed once all joined together as one land mass – the supercontinent of pangaea.

if you look at most world maps you will ponder how this is evidence, as the continents really don’t appear to ‘fit’ together very well.   what you need to understand is that the vast majority of maps are drawn using a map projection that has the north and south poles (which are points) are a line the width of the map at the top and bottom.   this means that the map distorts the true shape of the earth’s land and oceans as you love closer to the poles.     some other map projections distort less, but have the map shape looking like segments of an orange.   see here for a range of map projections.   check out the way greenland changes size in each!

what is more remarkable, is the next piece of evidence when added to the shape of continents.

location of mountains and fossils

what is remarkable, when you reassemble all the continents together, the ancient mountain ranges (many now eroded to their cores) and the location of rock types and fossils all match up.