The organisms are organized into a complex food web that draws its energy from light and dissolved nutrients in the water. Most of the inhabitants are smaller than 5mm long. They are born, reproduce, die or get eaten within a few days or weeks, living their whole lives within this little universe generation after generation. Biological diversity is the total number of different species that live together in a given environment. Each species occupies its own unique ecological niche .
Many factors can affect biological diversity.
This system has been specially designed to allow as many species as possible to live together in a relatively small volume of water. The nested arrangement of the tanks creates partially separated ecological zones or microhabitats . In nature, different microhabitats can occur naturally because of the physical size and structural diversity of the environment. Each microhabitat contains a different community of organisms that thrive there because they are all well adapted to the local conditions. Subdivision of an environment into smaller, partially separated microhabitats creates more niches , lowers competition between organisms and often allows more species to live in the same physical space.