Question

What is biological magnification? Will the levels of this magnification be different at different levels of the ecosystem?

Answer 1

Biological magnification is also known as bio amplification, it mainly tells about the concentration of toxins, such as pesticides in the tissues of tolerant organisms at higher levels in the food chain.

Complete step by step answer:
-There is a lot of environmental pollution happening in the present day, where industrial wastes are released into lakes and rivers.
-If there are any heavy metals and other toxins enter the rivers, lakes, and oceans.
-There is much aquatic life that lives in the areas of rivers, lakes, and oceans, and this aquatic life includes zooplankton, aquatic plants, and animals where those zooplankton, and plants absorb the water, so by that heavy metals and other toxins enter those organisms.
-And these aquatic organisms are taken as food by some small fishes and other aquatic life, and these small fishes are eaten by bigger fishes, and large birds and animals or humans.
-So these toxins used to accumulate and increase in the concentration in tissues of those animals.
-So they move up in the food chain in a progressive manner. This is because organisms of one trophic level are food for organisms of another trophic level.
-The main cause of the increase in biomagnification occurs due to persistence, where the substance cannot be broken down by the environmental process.
-At the same time the concentration of substance increases as they move up a food chain.

Note: There is another term called bioaccumulation, where the toxic substance increases in concentration in living organisms as they take in the air, water, and food and this is mainly because the substance is very slowly metabolized.