What is the energy pathway in the biosphere?

Answer 1

Energy flowing through a system has to come from somewhere and has to go somewhere because there are two laws of Physics that apply.

1. Energy can nether be created nor destroyed only changed - transformed.
2. Any time you make an energy transformation, some of the starting energy is going to be lost as heat.

In the Biosphere the source of energy is the Sun, sunlight. This is trapped and stored by plants (producers). As plants use this energy to live and grow, they give of heat (as per law 2) so the Sun's energy is transformed.

Then along come animals that eat plants and steal the plant's food stores, these animals have to be more active than plants so, as they live and move, these too give of heat. More of the Sun's original energy is lost (as per law 2).

The plant eaters are then predated by carnivores, the carnivores steal the herbivore's food stores and use it to live and move and these too give off heat. More of the Sun's original energy is lost (as per law 2).

Thus you can see that the process of life can be looked at as a flow of energy from organism to organism with this energy gradually being lost (into space) as heat. High quality energy (visible light) straight from the Sun is transformed into low quality energy (heat) by living things.

The second law means that you can not turn low quality energy into high quality energy and this make the path of energy transformation uni-directional.

Answer 2

The energy pathway is the transformation of energy from state to another.For example we rotate a motor through electricity.In this process electric energy converts to mechanical energy and gives momentum to rotate the wheel.Another example in steam engines we convert the energy of steam(latent heat) to mechanical energy.

So basically energy pathway in biosphere is transformation of energy from one state to another.

Answer 3

Flow of energy at the cellular level through the biosphere starts with solar energy. The next steps are the chloroplast and mitochondria.

Answer 4

Food Chain