What are chemoautotrophs?

Question

Here are some questions I can answer:

1. What are chemoautotrophs?

2. What 'fuels' chemoautotrophs?

3. Are chemoautotrophs important in Biology? Why?

Here are the answers:

1. Organisms that produce energy by chemosynthesis, oxidation of mineral(rarely organic) substances

2. The energy source for chemosynthesis comes from the oxidation rection of the mineral substance, not the substance itself.

3. Play an essential role in nature, by completing the circuits of many elements in nature(C,N,S). Nitrifying bacteria geive plants the N nutrients they need.

Since this is not my area of expertise, I searched Google under the key words "chemoautotrophs" to get these possible sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemotroph
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/C/chemoauto.html

I hope this helps a little more. Thanks for asking.

Answer 1

this was copied off another site if i'm correct.