That's why I always start thinking about decomposers around Easter.
|
|
I say I love detritivores, but I am especially fond of decomposers.
|
|
So it takes a village of detritivores and decomposers to recycle a corpse.
|
|
The truth is, detritivores and decomposers are physical phenomena, mortal organisms like you and me.
|
|
Dig by the Decomposers is worth noting for its excellently gory special effects, as is Canine by Acute Brow Productions.
|
|
The two terms are often used interchangeably, but technically, detritivores have a stomach: They ingest and digest dead matter, and decomposers don't.
|
|
As for the fruit flies, they'd be the consumers within this ecosystem, and the yeast would act as the decomposers, according to Chongqing University.
|
|
However, decomposers like bacteria and fungi usually don't have the biological hardware to break long plastic polymers back down into their individual building blocks.
|
|
A good way to brainstorm is to think about the animals that make up a food web: Who are the producers, consumers, detritivores and decomposers?
|
|
The nasty smells of the dead attract insects that disassemble the bulk of the body mass, and the altered acidity of our remains attracts fungal decomposers.
|
|
Fungi play a crucial ecological role as the principal decomposers of dead matter, a process that enriches environments with the nutrients needed to sustain new generations of life.
|
|
In the weekend's family art project, children can hear stories about such species and make models of them to decorate tall hats to wear in the Wormy, Squirmy Decomposers Parade.
|
|
Insects are "critical to how ecosystems grow and structure themselves," Saunders said, not only providing food for birds, lizards, mammals and frogs, but playing key roles as pollinators and decomposers.
|
|
Christ's body was said to have been untouched by decay when it was resurrected; but for the rest of us, the resurrection part of the life cycle is performed by decomposers.
|
|
If it's efficient land-based breakdown you are after, it's probably best to be buried under a pile of wood chips, which have lots of little air pockets to keep aerobic decomposers alive.
|
|
The truth is, not much will happen quickly to a corpse or anything organic if it's buried six feet under the soil's surface, because the diversity of decomposers drops off the deeper you go.
|
|
Decomposers, like fungi and bacteria, break down the chemical bonds that hold the molecules of dead things together and release the main elements of life — carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and sulfur — from their corporal bonds, freeing them to be used again.
|
|
Other highlights include family walks to search for fungi and insects; an urban composting demonstration; Decompostion Central, which offers discussions with experts, a "petting zoo" of harmless decomposers and a chance to observe dermestid (flesh-eating) beetles; and the Boneyard, where young visitors can try to reassemble an animal skeleton.
|
|
The fungi on this tree are decomposers. Decomposers are organisms that break down dead or decaying organisms, they carry out decomposition, a process possible by only certain kingdoms, such as fungi. Like herbivores and predators, decomposers are heterotrophic, meaning that they use organic substrates to get their energy, carbon and nutrients for growth and development. While the terms decomposer and detritivore are often interchangeably used, detritivores ingest and digest dead matter internally, while decomposers directly absorb nutrients through external chemical and biological processes.
|
|
Dead phytoplankton and other organisms sink to the bottom giving rise to large numbers of decomposers due to increased food supply (dead organisms, phytoplankton). Due to the increased number of decomposers that use more oxygen, fish and shrimp at the lower layers of the ocean become oxygen-starved and hypoxic zones become apparent.
|
|
Olson, J.S. (1963). "Energy storage and the balance of producers and decomposers in ecological systems". In: Ecology 44:322-331.
|
|
T. lanuginosus is a secondary sugar fungus and can participate in mutualistic relationships with some true cellulose decomposers of composts.
|
|
The mechanism presented is that ectomycorrhizal fungi can compete with free-living decomposers for nutrients, and thereby limit the rate of total decomposition. Since then there have been several other reports of ectomycorrhizal fungi reducing activity and decomposition rates of free-living decomposers and thereby increasing soil carbon storage.Berg B and Lindberg T. 1980.
|
|
The food chain usually consists of five levels of consumption which are producers, primary consumers, secondary consumers, tertiary consumers, and decomposers.
|
|
Like other pupinids, elephant pupinid snails are important decomposers, feeding on decaying organic matter under leaf litter on the forest floor.
|
|
In a detrital web, plant and animal matter is broken down by decomposers, e.g., bacteria and fungi, and moves to detritivores and then carnivores. There are often relationships between the detrital web and the grazing web. Mushrooms produced by decomposers in the detrital web become a food source for deer, squirrels, and mice in the grazing web.
|
|
The material they egest in their faeces has a large surface area, providing easy access for decomposers such as bacteria and fungi.
|
|
At the end of the food chain, decomposers such as bacteria and fungi break down dead plant and animal material into simple nutrients.
|
|
However, in a community where a shark species is present the shark becomes the apex predator, feeding on the tuna. Decomposers play a role in the trophic pyramid. They provide energy source and nutrients to the plant species in the community. Decomposers such as fungi and bacteria recycle energy back to the base of the food web by feeding on dead organisms from all trophic levels.
|
|
Diagram of the Silver Springs model (Odum, 1971). Note the aggregation into functional groups such as "herbivores" or "decomposers".Odum, H.T. (1971). Environment, Power, and Society.
|
|
While these flies carry many various types of Salmonella and viruses like the swine influenza, C. macellaria can also serve as important decomposers in our ecosystem.
|
|
Rhizophydiales are an important group of chytrid fungi. They are found in soil as well as marine and fresh water habitats where they function as parasites and decomposers.
|
|
Washington DC Thus, invertebrates such as earthworms, woodlice, and sea cucumbers are technically detritivores, not decomposers, since they must ingest nutrients - they are unable to absorb them externally.
|
|
Koide RT and Wu T. 2003. Ectomycorrhizas and retarded decomposition in a Pinus resinosa plantation. New Phytologist, 158: 401-407. It is possible that arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi may be outcompeting free-living decomposers for either water or nutrients in some systems as well; however, to date there is no demonstration of this, and it seems that arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi may more often increase, rather than decrease rates of decomposition by free- living microbial decomposers.
|
|
Buchanan, Peter. "Story: Fungi - Page 3 – Saprobes: decomposers - Use by Māori" at Te Ara: The Encyclopedia of New Zealand. Manatū Taonga Ministry for Culture and Heritage. Retrieved 19 September 2015.
|
|
Microorganisms have trouble consuming the high molecular weight dissolved substances, but quickly consume small molecules. From terrestrial sources black carbon produced by charring is an important component. Fungi are important decomposers in soil.
|
|
Fungi in the forest floor (Marselisborg Forests in Denmark) A skink, Eutropis multifasciata, in leaf litter in Sabah, Malaysia Many organisms that live on the forest floor are decomposers, such as fungi. Organisms whose diet consists of plant detritus, such as earthworms, are termed detritivores. The community of decomposers in the litter layer also includes bacteria, amoeba, nematodes, rotifer, tardigrades, springtails, cryptostigmata, potworms, insect larvae, mollusks, oribatid mites, woodlice, and millipedes. Even some species of microcrustaceans, especially copepods (for instance Bryocyclops spp.
|
|
Fungi are the primary decomposers in most environments, illustrated here Mycena interrupta. Necrophages are organisms that obtain nutrients by consuming decomposing dead animal biomass. The term derives from Greek , meaning 'dead', and , meaning 'to eat'.
|
|
A pin mold decomposing a peach Although often inconspicuous, fungi occur in every environment on Earth and play very important roles in most ecosystems. Along with bacteria, fungi are the major decomposers in most terrestrial (and some aquatic) ecosystems, and therefore play a critical role in biogeochemical cycles and in many food webs. As decomposers, they play an essential role in nutrient cycling, especially as saprotrophs and symbionts, degrading organic matter to inorganic molecules, which can then re-enter anabolic metabolic pathways in plants or other organisms.
|
|
The final habitat demonstrated at the HIBG is composed of needle-bearing trees. Coniferous woodlands are dark due to the dense canopy. This habitat is home to many mushrooms and other important decomposers in the food chain.
|
|
In food webs, saprophages generally play the roles of decomposers. There are two main branches of saprophges, broken down by nutrient source. There are necrophages which consume dead animal biomass, and thanatophages which consume dead plant biomass.
|
|
Termites are usually viewed as both herbivores and decomposers when present within an ecological community. In some cases, they are the link between mammalian consumers and the microbial decomposers that perform the final breaking down of organic matter within the local cycle of nutrients. A case of this relationship between termites and mammalian dung middens is observed in South Africa, between the endemic blesbok and harvester termites. The blesbok have been observed to deliberately place dung middens when they are in the vicinity of the harvester termite mounds.
|
|
It is usually found in a marine environments rich in algae and sea grass. It is capable of movement by use of this organelle. They are generally decomposers. They are cultivated for their active production of Omega-3 fatty acids.
|
|
In general, Gymnopus fruiting bodies are found in leaf and woody litter. Typically the fruiting bodies are relatively small and range from browns to white in color. Their spore deposit is white. Most species of gymnopus act as decomposers (saprotrophic).
|
|
Energy Diagram: energy and matter flows through an ecosystem, adapted from the Silver Springs model.Odum, H.T. (1971). Environment, Power, and Society. Wiley-Interscience New York, N.Y. H are herbivores, C are carnivores, TC are top carnivores, and D are decomposers.
|
|
In food webs, thanatophages generally play the roles of decomposers. The eating of wood, whether live or dead, is known as xylophagy. The activity of animals feeding only on dead wood is called sapro-xylophagy and those animals, sapro- xylophagous.
|
|
The concept of trophic level was developed by Raymond Lindeman (1942), based on the terminology of August Thienemann (1926): "producers", "consumers" and "reducers" (modified to "decomposers" by Lindeman).Lindeman, R. L. (1942). The trophic-dynamic aspect of ecology. Ecology 23: 399–418. link.
|
|
Litter produced by plants must be broken down by decomposers into nutrients available to organisms. Both bacteria and fungi produce extracellular enzymes to break down large molecules into compounds that can be taken up by plants.Skujins, R.G. 1976. Extracellular enzymes in soil.
|
|
A natural burial grave site. The existing landscape is modified as little as possible. Only flat stone markers are allowed. The body may be prepared without chemical preservatives or disinfectants such as embalming fluid, which might destroy the microbial decomposers that break the body down.
|
|
Slowed decomposition is biotically mediated in an ectomycorrhizal, tropical rain forest. Oecologia, 164: 785-795. A theoretical ecosystem model recently demonstrated that greater access to organic nitrogen by mycorrhizal fungi should slow decomposition of soil carbon by free-living decomposers by inducing nutrient limitation.
|
|
Twinflower, strawberries, bunchberries, horsetails and wintergreen form an attractive grown cover. The mineral soil is covered by a decaying cover of organic matter. Numerous consumers and decomposers create humus materials. Burrowing animals mix the new fertile materials with the soil to form a rich rooting compound.
|
|
Decomposers and detritivores complete this process, by consuming the remains left by scavengers. Scavengers aid in overcoming fluctuations of food resources in the environment. The process and rate of scavenging is affected by both biotic and abiotic factors, such as carcass size, habitat, temperature, and seasons.
|
|
Stomata have been counted and lignin remnants detected in the plant material, and the breathing apparatus of trigonotarbids—of the class Arachnida—(known as book lungs) can be seen in cross-sections. Fungal hyphae can be seen entering plant material, acting as decomposers and mycorrhizal symbionts.
|
|
Feral goats have a more indirect impact on the native fauna as a result of their effects on the vegetation and soil. The changes to the vegetation harm some native animals, whereas benefit a few like the ones that feed on goat dung, such as termites and decomposers.
|
|
They are also very important ecologically because they are decomposers. Blowflies are not only attracted to decomposing hosts but to some plants as well. C. loewi and other blowflies have been observed to be attracted to Phallus impudicus, the stinkhorn fungus, which tends to smell like carrion.Erzinçlioğlu, Zakaria. Blowflies.
|
|
Russet mite, Aceria anthocoptes is found on the invasive weed Cirsium arvense, the Canada thistle, across the world. It may be usable as a biological pest control agent for this weed. Mites occupy a wide range of ecological niches. For example, Oribatida mites are important decomposers in many habitats.
|
|
Scavengers play a fundamental role in the environment through the removal of decaying organisms, serving as a natural sanitation service. While microscopic and invertebrate decomposers break down dead organisms into simple organic matter which are used by nearby autotrophs, scavengers help conserve energy and nutrients obtained from carrion within the upper trophic levels, and are able to disperse the energy and nutrients farther away from the site of the carrion than decomposers. Scavenging unites animals which normally would not come into contact, and results in the formation of highly structured and complex communities which engage in nonrandom interactions. Scavenging communities function in the redistribution of energy obtained from carcasses and reducing diseases associated with decomposition.
|
|
Trophic species are functional groups that have the same predators and prey in a food web. Common examples of an aggregated node in a food web might include parasites, microbes, decomposers, saprotrophs, consumers, or predators, each containing many species in a web that can otherwise be connected to other trophic species.
|
|
Succession ends in an edaphic climax where topography, soil, water, fire, or other disturbances are such that a climatic climax cannot develop. ; Catastrophic Climax: Climax vegetation vulnerable to a catastrophic event such as a wildfire. For example, in California, chaparral vegetation is the final vegetation. The wildfire removes the mature vegetation and decomposers.
|
|
They also influence the quantity of plant and microbial biomass present. By breaking down dead organic matter, decomposers release carbon back to the atmosphere and facilitate nutrient cycling by converting nutrients stored in dead biomass back to a form that can be readily used by plants and other microbes.Chapin et al. (2002), p.
|
|
Typical layers of natural soil. A model for sheet mulching consists of the following steps: # The area of interest is flattened by trimming down existing plant species such as grasses. # The soil is analyzed and its pH is adjusted (if needed). # The soil is moisturized (if needed) to facilitate the activity of decomposers.
|
|
Hypotermes makhamensis is native to Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia. It is a forest-dwelling species and the colony builds and lives inside a complex epigeal (mound) nest. Termites are important in the ecology of the tropical and subtropical forests in the region as degraders of leaf litter and decomposers of dead wood.
|
|
The ecological preferences of Melanoleuca angelesiana and Neohygrophorus angelesianus are unknown. Non-gilled basidiomycetes include Pycnoporellus alboluteus and Tyromyces leucospongia. Ascomycete snowbank fungi include the decomposers Discina perlata, Gyromitra montana, Sarcosoma latahense, and Plectania nannfeldtii. Sarcosoma mexicanum is suspected to be mycorrhizal with spruce, while Caloscypha fulgens is a seed pathoden of Picea.
|
|
Heterotrophs consume the glucose, which further breaks down the compounds and passes them through webs (this process is called cellular respiration). Living systems and decomposers release the carbons as carbon dioxide. This carbon is cycled quickly, with estimates of 1,000 to 1000,000 million metric tons of carbon cycling through these pathways in a single year.
|
|
Ecosystem ecologist attempt to determine the underlying causes of these fluxes. Research in ecosystem ecology might measure primary production (g C/m^2) in a wetland in relation to decomposition and consumption rates (g C/m^2/y). This requires an understanding of the community connections between plants (i.e., primary producers) and the decomposers (e.g.
|
|
Similar to animals, fungi are heterotrophs, that is, they acquire their food by absorbing dissolved molecules, typically by secreting digestive enzymes into their environment. Growth is their means of mobility, except for spores, which may travel through the air or water (a few of which are flagellated). Fungi are the principal decomposers in ecological systems.
|
|
A simplified food web illustrating a three trophic food chain (producers-herbivores-carnivores) linked to decomposers. The movement of mineral nutrients is cyclic, whereas the movement of energy is unidirectional and noncyclic. Trophic species are encircled as nodes and arrows depict the links. Links in food webs map the feeding connections (who eats whom) in an ecological community.
|
|
Finally a self- perpetuating climax community develops. It may be a forest if the climate is humid, grassland in case of sub-humid environment, or a desert in arid and semi-arid conditions. A forest is characterized by presence of all types of vegetation including herbs, shrubs, mosses, shade-loving plants and trees. Decomposers are frequent in climax vegetation.
|
|
Such mollusks are hermaphroditic. Slugs most often function as decomposers but are also often omnivores. Arion ater is one such slug, decomposing organic matter, preying on other organisms, and consuming vegetative matter including agricultural crops. Native to Europe, the black slug is an invasive species in Australia, Canada (British Columbia, Newfoundland, Quebec), and the United States (Pacific Northwest).
|
|
Fungi are the primary decomposers in most environments, illustrated here Mycena interrupta. Saprophages are organisms that obtain nutrients by consuming decomposing dead plant or animal biomass. They are distinguished from detritivores in that saprophages are sessile consumers while detritivore are mobile. Typical saprophagic animals include sedentary polychaetes such as amphitrites (Amphitritinae, worms of the family Terebellidae) and other terebellids.
|
|
Members of this genus are small, convex to fan-shaped, and sessile. Species have cheilocystidia Spore prints are yellow-brown to brown. All species of Crepidotus are known to be secondary decomposers of plant matter; most are saprobic on wood. Little is known about the edibility of various species; the usually small and insubstantial specimens discourage mycophagy.
|
|
Heterotrophs can be classified by what they usually eat as herbivores, carnivores, omnivores, or decomposers. On the other hand, autotrophs are organisms that use energy directly from the sun or from chemical bonds. Commonly called producers. Autotrophs are vital all ecosystems because all organisms need organic molecules and only autotrophs can produce them from inorganic compounds.
|
|
99-104 :Note: In the food web main article, a food web was depicted as cyclic. That is based on the flow of the carbon and energy sources in a given ecosystem. The food web described here based solely on prey-predator roles; Organisms active in the carbon and nitrogen cycles (such as decomposers and fixers) are not considered in this description.
|
|
As a rule forest understories also experience higher humidity than exposed areas. The forest canopy reduces solar radiation, so the ground does not heat up or cool down as rapidly as open ground. Consequently, the understory dries out more slowly than more exposed areas do. The greater humidity encourages epiphytes such as ferns and mosses, and allows fungi and other decomposers to flourish.
|
|
A four level trophic pyramid sitting on a layer of soil and its community of decomposers. A three layer trophic pyramid linked to the biomass and energy flow concepts. In a pyramid of numbers, the number of consumers at each level decreases significantly, so that a single top consumer, (e.g., a polar bear or a human), will be supported by a much larger number of separate producers.
|
|
Clavaria rosea Most Clavaria species are thought to be saprotrophic, decomposing leaf litter and other organic materials on the woodland floor. In Europe, species are more frequently found in old, unimproved grasslands (i.e., not used agriculturally) where they are presumed to be decomposers of dead grass and moss. At least one species (Clavaria argillacea) is, however, typical of heathland and is a possible mycorrhizal associate of heather.
|
|
In above ground food webs, energy moves from producers (plants) to primary consumers (herbivores) and then to secondary consumers (predators). The phrase, trophic level, refers to the different levels or steps in the energy pathway. In other words, the producers, consumers, and decomposers are the main trophic levels. This chain of energy transferring from one species to another can continue several more times, but eventually ends.
|
|
Fungi can transfer carbon and nitrogen through their hyphal networks and thus, unlike bacteria, are not dependent solely on locally available resources. Decomposition rates vary among ecosystems. The rate of decomposition is governed by three sets of factors—the physical environment (temperature, moisture, and soil properties), the quantity and quality of the dead material available to decomposers, and the nature of the microbial community itself.Chapin et al.
|
|
However, the fluorescence is based on the accumulation of autoinducers which is proportional to cell density and therefore free-living photobacterium will not fluoresce. Their association with fish may be: symbiotic growth within fish for the formation of light organs, as a neutral entity on the surface or within the intestines of fish, as decomposers of dead fish, or as an agent of disease.
|
|
The soil surface texture varies from loamy sand to loam and is low to moderately sensitive to compaction. The more compaction, the less the soil is capable of supporting plant growth. Because of the short warm season and long, cold winters, vegetation routinely dies and decomposers do not have adequate time to breakdown all the material. As a result, the groundcover of litter is built up.
|
|
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. The base or basal species in a food web are those species without prey and can include autotrophs or saprophytic detritivores (i.e., the community of decomposers in soil, biofilms, and periphyton). Feeding connections in the web are called trophic links.
|
|
Academic Press. 3rd. p.700. There are many kinds of invertebrates, vertebrates and plants that carry out coprophagy. By doing so, all these detritivores contribute to decomposition and the nutrient cycles. They should be distinguished from other decomposers, such as many species of bacteria, fungi and protists, which are unable to ingest discrete lumps of matter, but instead live by absorbing and metabolizing on a molecular scale (saprotrophic nutrition).
|
|
Environment, Power, and Society. Wiley-Interscience New York, N.Y. H are herbivores, C are carnivores, TC are top carnivores, and D are decomposers. Squares represent biotic pools and ovals are fluxes or energy or nutrients from the system. Later work by Eugene Odum and Howard T. Odum quantified flows of energy and matter at the ecosystem level, thus documenting the general ideas proposed by Clements and his contemporary Charles Elton.
|
|
No coal deposits are known from the Early Triassic, and those in the Middle Triassic are thin and low-grade. This "coal gap" has been explained in many ways. It has been suggested that new, more aggressive fungi, insects and vertebrates evolved and killed vast numbers of trees. These decomposers themselves suffered heavy losses of species during the extinction and are not considered a likely cause of the coal gap.
|
|
This is a process called eutrophication, where oxygen levels decrease as elements such nitrogen and phosphorus increase. A healthy river will have increased amounts of oxygen for consumption by organisms (1). As nitrogen increases, algae (5) produce large amounts of oxygen, but die from increased nitrogen. Decomposers then use all of the remaining oxygen decomposing the algae, resulting in no oxygen left and no oxygen being produced. (2).
|
|
The Labyrinthulomycetes (ICBN) or Labyrinthulea (ICZN) are a class of protists that produce a network of filaments or tubes, which serve as tracks for the cells to glide along and absorb nutrients for them. The two main groups are the labyrinthulids (or slime nets) and thraustochytrids. They are mostly marine, commonly found as parasites on algae and seagrasses or as decomposers on dead plant material. They also include some parasites of marine invertebrates.
|
|
The apple snail is a keystone species in Pantanal's ecosystem. When the wetlands are flooded once a year, the grass and other plants will eventually die and start to decay. During this process, decomposing microbes deplete the shallow water of all oxygen, suffocating larger decomposers. Unlike other decomposing animals, the apple snail have both gills and lungs, making it possible for them to thrive in anoxic waters where they recycle the nutrients.
|
|
There are 15 species of hemiptera, and 12 booklice. Only 13 terrestrial invertebrates are recognised as endemic, although information on many species in lacking and it is suspected up to two thirds of species found are actually endemic, including 16 spiders. Insects are important as decomposers, and also make up a large portion of the diet of some bird species. Due to the island environment, many insect species have developed reduced or absent wings.
|
|
Their teeth grind the food up, enzymes and acid in the stomach liquefy it, and additional enzymes in the small intestine break the food down into parts their cells can use. Although fungi do not have a digestive tract like humans, they still use extracellular digestion. Fungi and other decomposers utilize nutrients derived from breaking down the substrate they grow on. Another example of extracellular digestion being used is in the hydra, or sea anemone.
|
|
Microorganisms are the backbone of all ecosystems, but even more so in the zones where photosynthesis is unable to take place because of the absence of light. In such zones, chemosynthetic microbes provide energy and carbon to the other organisms. These chemotrophic organisms can also function in environments lacking oxygen by using other electron acceptors for their respiration. Other microbes are decomposers, with the ability to recycle nutrients from other organisms' waste products.
|
|
Over time the hole will fill with rain water, fallen leaves, animal excrement and other organic matter which over time becomes a habitat for decomposers which soon form a community on the thick organic layer and so are able to nurture certain types of organisms.Clinton, Barton D.; Baker, Corey R. 2000. Catastrophic windthrow in the southern Appalachians: characteristics of pits and mounds and initial vegetation responses. Forest Ecology and Management 126: 51-60.
|
|
PT Petrokimia Gresik has two product categories, namely fertilizer and non-fertilizer. For subsidized fertilizer, PT Petrokimia Gresik produces Urea, NPK (Phonska), Petroganik (organic fertilizer), SP-36, and ZA fertilizers. As for non-subsidies, PT Petrokimia Gresik produces NPK Kebomas, ZK, DAP, KCL, Rock Phosphate, Petronik, Petro Kalimas, Petro Biofertil, and Agricultural Lime. For the non-fertilizer category, PT Petrokimia Gresik produces superior rice seeds under the name Petroseed and Petro Hybrid, as well as decomposers named Petro Gladiator.
|
|
A banana slug eating a small plant in Big Basin Redwoods State Park Banana slugs are detritivores, or decomposers. They process leaves, animal droppings, moss, and dead plant material, and then recycle them into soil humus. They seem to have a fondness for mushrooms, spread seeds and spores when they eat, and excrete a nitrogen rich fertilizer. By consuming detritus (dead organic matter) slugs contribute to decomposition and the nutrient cyclesWetzel, R. G. Limnology: Lake and River Ecosystems.
|
|
The larvae and adults are considered neither pests nor vectors. Instead, black soldier fly larvae play a similar role to that of redworms as essential decomposers in breaking down organic substrates and returning nutrients to the soil. The larvae have voracious appetites and can be used for composting household food scraps and agricultural waste products. Additionally, black soldier fly larvae (BSFL) are an alternative source of protein for aquaculture, animal feed, pet food and human nutrition.
|
|
Serious concerns also being raised about taxonomic groups that do not receive the same degree of social attention or attract funds as the vertebrates. These include fungal (including lichen-forming species), invertebrate (particularly insect) and plant communities where the vast majority of biodiversity is represented. Conservation of fungi and conservation of insects, in particular, are both of pivotal importance for conservation biology. As mycorrhizal symbionts, and as decomposers and recyclers, fungi are essential for sustainability of forests.
|
|
Woodboring beetles most often attack dying or dead trees. In forest settings, they are important in the turnover of trees by culling weak trees, thus allowing new growth to occur. They are also important as primary decomposers of trees within forest systems, allowing for the recycling of nutrients locked away in the relatively decay-resilient woody material of trees. To develop and reach maturity woodboring beetles need nutrients provided by fungi from outside of the inhabited wood.
|
|
Forensic entomology has gained a strong legitimacy in recent years for introducing vital evidence into investigations worldwide. Without the collection and preservation of insects, associated with a death scene, we could not properly estimate the time of death as well as other valuable information concerning the circumstances of the body. Human corpses, no matter the manner of death, are aided by insect decomposers. This makes the storage of the body prior to the autopsy, a vital step in the field of forensics.
|
|
Fungi are the principal decomposers in ecological systems. These and other differences place fungi in a single group of related organisms, named the Eumycota (true fungi or Eumycetes), which share a common ancestor (from a monophyletic group), an interpretation that is also strongly supported by molecular phylogenetics. This fungal group is distinct from the structurally similar myxomycetes (slime molds) and oomycetes (water molds). The discipline of biology devoted to the study of fungi is known as mycology (from the Greek μύκης ', mushroom).
|
|
Sequoiadendron giganteum (giant sequoia) cones and foliage, sugar pine and white fir foliage, and other plant litter constitute the duff layer that covers the ground of Mariposa Grove in Yosemite National Park, United States. The corpses of dead plants or animals, material derived from animal tissues (e.g. molted skin), and fecal matter gradually lose their form due to physical processes and the action of decomposers, including grazers, bacteria, and fungi. Decomposition, the process by which organic matter is decomposed, occurs in several phases.
|
|
Some species have been spread over large territories in association with livestock. Adult flies are found mostly on mammal excrement, including that of humans (less often on other rotting organic matter), where eggs are laid and larvae develop, and on nearby vegetation, carrion, fermenting tree sap, and shrubs and herbs. Many Sepsidae apparently play an important biological role as decomposers of mammal and other animal excrement. Some species may have a limited hygienic importance because of their association with human feces.
|
|
The primary decomposer of litter in many ecosystems is fungi. Unlike bacteria, which are unicellular organisms and are decomposers as well, most saprotrophic fungi grow as a branching network of hyphae. While bacteria are restricted to growing and feeding on the exposed surfaces of organic matter, fungi can use their hyphae to penetrate larger pieces of organic matter, below the surface. Additionally, only wood-decay fungi have evolved the enzymes necessary to decompose lignin, a chemically complex substance found in wood.
|
|
These two factors make fungi the primary decomposers in forests, where litter has high concentrations of lignin and often occurs in large pieces. Fungi decompose organic matter by releasing enzymes to break down the decaying material, after which they absorb the nutrients in the decaying material. Hyphae used to break down matter and absorb nutrients are also used in reproduction. When two compatible fungi hyphae grow close to each other, they will then fuse together for reproduction, and form another fungus.
|
|
Snowbank fungi include members of the Basidiomycota and the Ascomycota. Mycorrhizal basidiomycetes include Cortinarius ahsii, C. auchmerus, C. clandestinus, C. croceus, and some others that are provisionally named, as well as the gasteroid species Pholiota nubigena. White-spored species include the saprobes Clitocybe albirhiza, C. glacialis, Lentinellus montanus (formerly Lyophyllum), Mycena overholtsii, and the conifer cone decomposers Strobilurus albipilatus and S. occidentalis. Also white spored, H. goetzii, H. marzuolus, and H. subalpinus are believed to be (or suspected to be) mycorrhizal with conifers.
|
|
In arid ecosystems, there is low total precipitation and high variability in size of rain events (pulses) within and between years. Differences in how plants and decomposers respond to these pulses of precipitation affects biogeochemical cycling within the ecosystem. For example, extracellular enzymes present in the soil become active nearly instantaneously after any moisture pulse, while production in microbes and plants have lag times of various durations, and require pulse events of different sizes. Williams, C.A., Hanan, N., Scholes, R.J., Kutsch, W. 2009.
|
|
The scientific discipline devoted to the study of ticks and mites is called acarology. Most mites are tiny, less than in length, and have a simple, unsegmented body plan. Their small size makes them easily overlooked; some species live in water, many live in soil as decomposers, others live on plants, sometimes creating galls, while others again are predators or parasites. This last type includes the commercially important Varroa parasite of honey bees, as well as the scabies mite of humans.
|
|
This high rate of decomposition is the result of phosphorus levels in the soils, precipitation, high temperatures and the extensive microorganism communities. In addition to the bacteria and other microorganisms, there are an abundance of other decomposers such as fungi and termites that aid in the process as well. Nutrient recycling is important because below ground resource availability controls the above ground biomass and community structure of tropical rainforests. These soils are typically phosphorus limited, which inhibits net primary productivity or the uptake of carbon.
|
|
The consumption of the litterfall by decomposers results in the breakdown of simple carbon compounds into carbon dioxide (CO2) and water (H2O), and releases inorganic ions (like nitrogen and phosphorus) into the soil where the surrounding plants can then reabsorb the nutrients that were shed as litterfall. In this way, litterfall becomes an important part of the nutrient cycle that sustains forest environments. As litter decomposes, nutrients are released into the environment. The portion of the litter that is not readily decomposable is known as humus.
|
|
Lectivores, such as many termites, gather dead plant material (Latin: lectus=bed which is the root of the word litter, as in leaf-litter) and thanatophages (Greek: thanatos=death), such as pillbugs mine piles of dead plant material. Carnivore and herbivore are generic multigroup categories for gathers respectively of animal and plant material, irrespective of whether live or dead. Croppers, scavengers, and detritivores are gatherers respectively of live, dead, and particulate material. Parasites, saprophages, and decomposers are miners respectively of live, dead, and particulate material.
|
|
Snags are an important structural component in forest communities, making up 10–20% of all trees present in old-growth tropical, temperate, and boreal forests. Snags and downed coarse woody debris represent a large portion of the woody biomass in a healthy forest. In temperate forests, snags provide critical habitat for more than 100 species of bird and mammal, and snags are often called 'wildlife trees' by foresters. Dead, decaying wood supports a rich community of decomposers like bacteria and fungi, insects, and other invertebrates.
|
|
Gulf killifish use different ways to cope with low oxygen conditions, including behavioral changes, physiological changes, and changes to biochemical processes. One main threat because it decreases the levels of dissolved oxygen is the Louisiana dead zone, which kills large numbers of fish every year. This dead zone results from nutrient- and chemical-rich water from the Mississippi River Valley basin entering the Gulf of Mexico. This eutrophic water ultimately leads to no dissolved oxygen remaining within the ecosystem because of increased activities of algae and decomposers.
|
|
Over many generations, the colony creates a large skeleton that is characteristic of the species. Diverse forms of life take up residence in a coral colony, including photosynthetic algae such as Symbiodinium, as well as a wide range of bacteria including nitrogen fixers, and chitin decomposers, all of which form an important part of coral nutrition. The association between coral and its microbiota is species dependent, and different bacterial populations are found in mucus, skeleton and tissue from the same coral fragment. Over the past several decades, major declines in coral populations have occurred.
|
|
When the egg is buried deeply enough, the bacteria decomposing it no longer have access to oxygen and need to power their metabolisms with different substances. These physiological changes in the decomposers also alter the local environment in a way that allows certain minerals to be deposited, while others remain in solution. Generally, however, a fossilizing egg's shell keeps the same calcite it had in life, which allows scientists to study its original structure millions of years after the developing dinosaur hatched or died. However, eggs can also sometimes be altered after burial.
|
|
The genus Acrophialophora consist of 3 species: A. fusispora, A. levis, and A. seudatica, while A. fusispora, A. nainiana, and M. indica were found to be of the same species, now labeled with a single name, A. fusispora. The 3 species are differentiated by consistent morphological differences, such as conidial size, shape, or color. Through genetic analysis, A. fusispora was found to belong to the family Chaetomiaceae, which includes mostly cellulose decomposers found in the soil, and thermotolerant opportunistic pathogens. Elements of the taxonomy of A. fusispora remain unresolved.
|
|
After an animal has digested eaten material, the remains of that material are discharged from its body as waste. Although it is lower in energy than the food from which it is derived, feces may retain a large amount of energy, often 50% of that of the original food. This means that of all food eaten, a significant amount of energy remains for the decomposers of ecosystems. Many organisms feed on feces, from bacteria to fungi to insects such as dung beetles, who can sense odors from long distances.
|
|
It has been suggested that this could be due to the fact that termite mounds are built on ground where the surrounding is cleared. This allows the blesboks greater ability to detect predators if foraging in the area, and termite presence in the vicinity could be an indicator of richer resources available from recycling of nutrients. Since decomposers such as termites increase the quality of the surrounding vegetation for foraging, this suggests that there is a positive evolutionary feedback within this interaction, with both participants in this interaction providing resources for the other.
|
|
The rapid growth rate of Salvinia molesta has resulted in its classification as an invasive weed in some parts of the world such as Australia, United Kingdom, New Zealand, and parts of America. Surfaces of ponds, reservoirs, and lakes are covered by a floating mat 10–20 cm (in some rare cases up to 60 cm) thick. The plant's growth clogs waterways and blocks sunlight needed by other aquatic plants and especially algae to carry out photosynthesis, thereby deoxygenating the water. As it dies and decays, decomposers use up the oxygen in the water.
|
|
Without producers, the cornerstone of most ecosystems, a unique ecosystem forms. Rather than relying on producers to form the base of the food pyramid, organisms living in the abyssal zone must feed on the dead organic detritus that falls from oceanic layers above. The biomass of the abyssal zone actually increases near the seafloor as compared to areas above as most of the decomposing material and decomposers rest on the seabed. The sea floor of the abyssal zone consists of or is layered by different materials depending on the depth of the sea floor.
|
|
Century Dictionary entry for pyrenomycetes Sordariomycetes possess great variability in morphology, growth form, and habitat. Most have perithecial (flask-shaped) fruiting bodies, but ascomata can be less frequently cleistothecial (like in the genera Anixiella, Apodus, Boothiella, Thielavia, Zopfiella),. Fruiting bodies may be solitary or gregarious, superficial, or immersed within stromata or tissues of the substrates and can be light to bright or black. Members of this group can grow in soil, dung, leaf litter, and decaying wood as decomposers, as well as being fungal parasites, and insect, human, and plant pathogens.
|
|
The three-domain system of classifying life adds another division: the prokaryotes are divided into two domains of life, the microscopic bacteria and the microscopic archaea, while everything else, the eukaryotes, become the third domain. Prokaryotes play important roles in ecosystems as decomposers recycling nutrients. Some prokaryotes are pathogenic, causing disease and even death in plants and animals.2002 WHO mortality data Accessed 20 January 2007 Marine prokaryotes are responsible for significant levels of the photosynthesis that occurs in the ocean, as well as significant cycling of carbon and other nutrients.
|
|
There are many different types of primary producers out in the Earth's ecosystem at different states. Fungi and other organisms that gain their biomass from oxidizing organic materials are called decomposers and are not primary producers. However, lichens located in tundra climates are an exceptional example of a primary producer that, by mutualistic symbiosis, combine photosynthesis by algae (or additionally nitrogen fixation by cyanobacteria) with the protection of a decomposer fungus. Also, plant-like primary producers (trees, algae) use the sun as a form of energy and put it into the air for other organisms.
|
|
A sarcophagid "bubbling" As ubiquitous insects, dipterans play an important role at various trophic levels both as consumers and as prey. In some groups the larvae complete their development without feeding, and in others the adults do not feed. The larvae can be herbivores, scavengers, decomposers, predators or parasites, with the consumption of decaying organic matter being one of the most prevalent feeding behaviours. The fruit or detritus is consumed along with the associated micro-organisms, a sieve-like filter in the pharynx being used to concentrate the particles, while flesh-eating larvae have mouth-hooks to help shred their food.
|
|
These will convert polymer hydroperoxides to alcohols, becoming oxidized to organophosphates in the process: :ROOH + P(OR')3 → OP(OR')3 \+ ROH Transesterification can then take place, in which the hydroxylated polymer is exchanged for a phenol: :ROH + OP(OR')3 → R'OH + OP(OR')2OR This exchange further stabilizes the polymer by releasing a primary antioxidant, because of this phosphites are sometimes considered multi-functional antioxidants as they can combine both types of activity. Organosulfur compounds are also efficient hydroperoxide decomposers, with thioethers being particularly effective against long-term thermal aging, they are ultimately oxidise up to sulfoxides and sulfones.
|
|
The genome encodes the ability to degrade a variety of sugars, amino acids, alcohols and metabolic intermediates and also can use complex substrates such as xylan, hemicelluloses, pectin, starch and chitin. A. capsulatum contains a large number of glycoside hydrolase-encoding genes and genes that encode plant cell wall-degrading enzymes, with a particularly large cluster that encodes pectin degradation. These suggest an important role for carbohydrates in nutritional pathways, as well as in desiccation resistance. The polymer degrading properties reveal acidobacteria as decomposers in the soil that potentially participate in the cycling of plant, fungal and insect derived organic matters.
|
|
In the sulfur cycle, archaea that grow by oxidizing sulfur compounds release this element from rocks, making it available to other organisms, but the archaea that do this, such as Sulfolobus, produce sulfuric acid as a waste product, and the growth of these organisms in abandoned mines can contribute to acid mine drainage and other environmental damage. In the carbon cycle, methanogen archaea remove hydrogen and play an important role in the decay of organic matter by the populations of microorganisms that act as decomposers in anaerobic ecosystems, such as sediments, marshes, and sewage-treatment works.
|
|
The Ascomycota fulfil a central role in most land-based ecosystems. They are important decomposers, breaking down organic materials, such as dead leaves and animals, and helping the detritivores (animals that feed on decomposing material) to obtain their nutrients. Ascomycetes along with other fungi can break down large molecules such as cellulose or lignin, and thus have important roles in nutrient cycling such as the carbon cycle. The fruiting bodies of the Ascomycota provide food for many animals ranging from insects and slugs and snails (Gastropoda) to rodents and larger mammals such as deer and wild boars.
|
|
For example, aboveground herbivores can overgraze an area and decrease the grass population, but decomposers cannot directly influence the rate of falling plant litter. They can only indirectly influence the rate of input into their system through nutrient recycling which, by helping plants to grow, eventually creates more litter and detritus to fall. If the entire soil food web were completely donor controlled, however, bacterivores and fungivores would never greatly affect the bacteria and fungi they consume. While bottom-up effects are no doubt important, many soil ecologists suspect that top-down effects are also sometimes significant.
|
|
Biodiversity within ecosystems can be organized into trophic pyramids, in which the vertical dimension represents feeding relations that become further removed from the base of the food chain up toward top predators, and the horizontal dimension represents the abundance or biomass at each level. When the relative abundance or biomass of each species is sorted into its respective trophic level, they naturally sort into a 'pyramid of numbers'. Species are broadly categorized as autotrophs (or primary producers), heterotrophs (or consumers), and Detritivores (or decomposers). Autotrophs are organisms that produce their own food (production is greater than respiration) by photosynthesis or chemosynthesis.
|
|
The legume vine Mucuna pruriens is used in the countries of Benin and Vietnam as a biological control for problematic Imperata cylindrica grass: the vine is extremely vigorous and suppresses neighbouring plants by out-competing them for space and light. Mucuna pruriens is said not to be invasive outside its cultivated area. Desmodium uncinatum can be used in push-pull farming to stop the parasitic plant, witchweed (Striga). The Australian bush fly, Musca vetustissima, is a major nuisance pest in Australia, but native decomposers found in Australia are not adapted to feeding on cow dung, which is where bush flies breed.
|
|
Phenotypic strategy switches of microbes capable of provoking sepsis Some authors suggest that initiating sepsis by the normally mutualistic (or neutral) members of the microbiome may not always be an accidental side effect of the deteriorating host immune system. Rather it is often an adaptive microbial response to a sudden decline of host survival chances. Under this scenario, the microbe species provoking sepsis benefit from monopolizing the future cadaver, utilizing its biomass as decomposers, and then transmitting through soil or water to establish mutualistic relations with new individuals. The bacteria Streptococcus pneumoniae, Escherichia coli, Proteus spp.
|
|
Insects play a critical role as pollinators, decomposers, and as a part of the food web. Many nesting birds rely on them for food in the summer months. The cold winters and short summers make the taiga a challenging biome for reptiles and amphibians, which depend on environmental conditions to regulate their body temperatures, and there are only a few species in the boreal forest including red-sided garter snake, common European adder, blue- spotted salamander, northern two-lined salamander, Siberian salamander, wood frog, northern leopard frog, boreal chorus frog, American toad, and Canadian toad. Most hibernate underground in winter.
|
|
These reactions are particularly important in the oceans. In the sulfur cycle, archaea that grow by oxidizing sulfur compounds release this element from rocks, making it available to other organisms, but the archaea that do this, such as Sulfolobus, produce sulfuric acid as a waste product, and the growth of these organisms in abandoned mines can contribute to acid mine drainage and other environmental damage. In the carbon cycle, methanogen archaea remove hydrogen and play an important role in the decay of organic matter by the populations of microorganisms that act as decomposers in anaerobic ecosystems, such as sediments and marshes.
|
|
It is one of the richest components of the ecosystem from the standpoint of biodiversity because of the large number of decomposers and predators present, mostly belonging to invertebrates, fungi, algae, bacteria, and archaea. Certain (adapted) plants may be more apparent in tropical forests, where rates of metabolism and species diversity are much higher than in colder climates. The major compartments for the storage of organic matter and nutrients within systems are the living vegetation, forest floor, and soil. The forest floor serves as a bridge between the above ground living vegetation and the soil, and it is a crucial component in nutrient transfer through the biogeochemical cycle.
|
|
More recently, other research, modeling the real biochemical cycles of Earth, and using various types of organisms (e.g. photosynthesisers, decomposers, herbivores and primary and secondary carnivores) has also been shown to produce Daisyworld- like regulation and stability, which helps to explain planetary biological diversity. This enables nutrient recycling within a regulatory framework derived by natural selection amongst species, where one being's harmful waste becomes low energy food for members of another guild. This research on the Redfield ratio of nitrogen to phosphorus shows that local biotic processes can regulate global systems (See Keith Downing & Peter Zvirinsky, The Simulated Evolution of Biochemical Guilds: Reconciling Gaia Theory with Natural Selection).
|
|
Mycorrhizal fungi are nutrient rich structures compared to the roots they colonize, and it is possible that mycorrhizal colonization of roots leads to increased rates of root decomposition because decomposers would have greater access to nutrients. Evidence is equivocal on this point, as ectomycorrhizal colonization does increase fine root decomposition rates substantially compared to uncolonized roots in some ecosystems,Koide RT, Fernandez CW and Peoples MS. 2011. Can ectomycorrhizal colonization of Pinus resinosa roots affect their decomposition? New Phytologist, 191: 508-514 while Pinus edulis roots colonized predominately by ectomycorrhizal fungi from the Ascomycota group have been found to decompose more slowly than uncolonized controls.
|
|
Energy and carbon enter ecosystems through photosynthesis, are incorporated into living tissue, transferred to other organisms that feed on the living and dead plant matter, and eventually released through respiration. The carbon and energy incorporated into plant tissues (net primary production) is either consumed by animals while the plant is alive, or it remains uneaten when the plant tissue dies and becomes detritus. In terrestrial ecosystems, roughly 90% of the net primary production ends up being broken down by decomposers. The remainder is either consumed by animals while still alive and enters the plant-based trophic system, or it is consumed after it has died, and enters the detritus-based trophic system.
|
|
Because of the change in the runoff rates of James Bay, massively increasing in the winter months, and increasing considerably in the summer as well, there has been more extreme fluctuation in the water levels. This has killed many trees along the shoreline, which are not equipped with deep enough root systems and tolerance of prolonged exposure to seawater to withstand these fluctuations. As well, the increased riverbank erosion downstream of the dams has washed the flora’s habitat down the river. The result has been considerable decay (decomposition) of dead trees along the shoreline, consequently releasing stored mercury into the area's terrestrial ecosystem through bioaccumulation in decomposers and detritovores and eventual biomagnification up the food web.
|
|
Both the anthroposystem and ecosystem can be divided into three groups: producers, consumers, and recyclers. In the ecosystem, the producers or autotrophs consist of plants and some bacteria capable of producing their own food via photosynthesis or chemical synthesis, the consumers consist of animals that obtain energy from grazing and/or by feeding on other animals and the recyclers consist of decomposers such as fungi and bacteria. In the anthroposystem, the producers consist of the energy production through fossil fuels, manufacturing with non-fuel minerals and growing food; the consumers consist of humans and domestic animals and the recyclers consist of the decomposing or recycling activities (i.e. waste water treatment, metal and solid waste recycling).
|
|
Two N. vespilloides preparing a carcass Already a model system in evolutionary ecology due to their extensive parental care, burying beetles like N. vespilloides hunt for small vertebrate carcasses which they then bury before intricately preparing it as a resource for its larvae to breed on-these carcasses are scarce and ephemeral yet are necessary for burying beetles' reproductive success. Carcasses are highly contested resources with challenges being launched by other burying beetles and other scavenging species, as well as microbial decomposers. Older carcasses have a higher microbial load and thus have a lower quality as a breeding resource: larvae raised on these carcasses are smaller and in a worse nutritional state–at adulthood these beetles were also smaller, which in N. vespilloides reduces fitness. Daniel Rozen et al.
|
|
Through this process of eating the detritus many times over and harvesting the microorganisms from it, the detritus thins out, becomes fractured and becomes easier for the microorganisms to use, and so the complex carbohydrates are also steadily broken down and disappear over time. What is left behind by the detritivores is then further broken down and recycled by decomposers, such as bacteria and fungi. This detritus cycle plays a large part in the so-called purification process, whereby organic materials carried in by rivers is broken down and disappears, and an extremely important part in the breeding and growth of marine resources. In ecosystems on land, far more essential material is broken down as dead material passing through the detritus chain than is broken down by being eaten by animals in a living state.
|
|
Termite mound as an obstacle on a runway at Khorixas (Namibia) Termite damage on external structure Owing to their wood-eating habits, many termite species can do significant damage to unprotected buildings and other wooden structures. Termites play an important role as decomposers of wood and vegetative material, and the conflict with humans occurs where structures and landscapes containing structural wood components, cellulose derived structural materials and ornamental vegetation provide termites with a reliable source of food and moisture. Their habit of remaining concealed often results in their presence being undetected until the timbers are severely damaged, with only a thin exterior layer of wood remaining, which protects them from the environment. Of the 3,106 species known, only 183 species cause damage; 83 species cause significant damage to wooden structures.
|
|
Soil organic carbon pools in the northern circumpolar permafrost region. Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 23(2) doi: 10.1029/2008GB003327 Understanding what maintains the soil carbon pool is important to understand the current distribution of carbon on Earth, and how it will respond to environmental change. While much research has been done on how plants, free-living microbial decomposers, and soil minerals affect this pool of carbon, it is recently coming to light that mycorrhizal fungi—symbiotic fungi that associate with roots of almost all living plants—may play an important role in maintaining this pool as well. Measurements of plant carbon allocation to mycorrhizal fungi have been estimated to be 5-20% of total plant carbon uptake,Pearson JN and Jakobsen I. 1993. The relative contribution of hyphae and roots to phosphorus uptake by arbuscular mycorrhizal plants, measured by dual labeling with 32P and 33P. New Phytologist, 124: 489-494.Hobbie JE and Hobbie EA. 2006. 15N in symbiotic fungi and plants estimates nitrogen and carbon flux rates in arctic tundra. Ecology, 87: 816-822 and in some ecosystems the biomass of mycorrhizal fungi can be comparable to the biomass of fine roots.
|
|