Question

What are chemoautotrophs? Give an example?

Answer 1

Hint: An organism which creates its own inorganic chemicals energy and biological materials. They are usually located in areas where plants, such as at the bottom of the ocean or in acidic hot springs, cannot thrive.

Complete answer:
"Autotrophs" in nature are species that do not need to feed because they generate their own biological materials and resources. This word originates in the Greek "auto" for "self" and "troph" for "eat" or "feed."

Chemoautotrophs and photoautotrophs are the two main forms of autotrophs.
> Photoautotrophs create their biological materials using energy from the sunlight. These involve green plants and algae which are photosynthesized.

> On the other hand, chemoautotrophs obtain energy from inorganic chemicals for their life-functions. They feed on strong electron donor chemicals, such as hydrogen sulphide, sulphur, or iron.

Chemoautotrophs, like all autotrophs, can 'fix' carbon. They take carbon atoms from inorganic compounds, including carbon dioxide, and use it to produce organic compounds including sugars, proteins, and lipids. Some forms of chemoautotrophs in plant-based ecosystems also play critical roles. Although plants undergo carbon fixation in these environments, many plants rely on chemoautotrophic bacteria to fix nitrogen, which is required to produce amino acids and proteins.

Examples of Chemoautotrophs are:
- Nitrosomonas is a genus of the bacteria that fix nitrogen. Nitrogen fixation is an extremely important principle in agriculture where many crops are unable to bind themselves to nitrogen. To guarantee that the soil contains sufficient organic nitrogen compounds to grow, farmers must make sure there's enough nitrogen-fixing bacteria available to support their crops, or add artificial forms of nitrogen fertiliser compounds.

- Methanogens are methane-producing bacteria. They are chemoautotrophs which produce methane and other organic compounds by the energy from the electrons contained in hydrogen gas. They can be found at the bottom of the ocean, where they produce large bubbles of methane under the ocean floor. They are also present in swamps and marshes, where they are responsible for the production of "swamp gas" methane.

Note: Deep sea winds sustain active ecosystems largely driven by chemoautotrophs. Chemoautotrophs are species which are capable of fixing inorganic carbon using a chemical energy obtained by oxidising reduced compounds. But they also play important roles in ecosystems dependent on plants.